


The Space Between Us

by inkarnate



Series: The Renee Olson Trilogy [1]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Bellamy Blake fanfiction, Clarke Griffin sister relationship, F/M, Gen, Octavia Blake sister relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-15
Updated: 2018-07-16
Packaged: 2019-06-11 01:06:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 31
Words: 80,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15304047
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inkarnate/pseuds/inkarnate
Summary: 'The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched—they must be felt with the heart.'The battle between heart and head is one that Renee Olson knows all too well. She has known Bellamy Blake her whole life. She has seen him at his best and she has seen him at his absolute worse. No one knows him better than she does, and vice versa. He was her rock—the one thing in her life that she knew would always be there. Until the day he disappeared.After his mysterious disappearance, Renee is dead-set on finding out where Bellamy went and what happened to him. She is shocked when she uncovers not just the truth about her best friend and his whereabouts, but the truth about life on the Ark. Sh doesn't let it stop her. The thing about this due is that nothing can keep them apart. Not the stars, not the universe, not even the vast expanse of space.





	1. The Calm Before the Storm

MY MOTHER ALWAYS TOLD me that a smile can cure anything. ' _You can't ever truly know the person standing next to you unless you've walked a mile in their shoes_ ,' she would say (I found out years later that she stole part of it from a two-hundred-year-old book she once read in school). ' _You can't know their past, or their future, or their present. So smile. It might just brighten their day_.' I was just like my mother. She was my best friend. Like her, my mind was always turning. I never stopped; watching; observing. I watched life go on around me. I observed the people around me.

 When I passed people, I nodded my head and flashed empty smiles at them. That's what everyone did. They were people that I didn't know well enough to speak to, but wasn't so unfamiliar with that I would walk past them without some form of acknowledgement. Many of them I had spoken to only once, maybe twice, in my life. Others, I only knew because my mother knew them at some point. I didn't know their names and they didn't know mine, but common courtesy urged us to greet each other in the form of a silent expression.

I kept to myself. I had a small circle of people I was close to and I liked it that way. The way I saw it, the fewer people that knew my name, the less chance that anything would go wrong. When you get involved with someone emotionally, their problems become yours. I had enough of those on my own without taking on other people's.

I observed Abigail Griffin as she examined my knee. She used a small, hammer-like instrument to gently hit the spot under my knee. My leg jumped, and I was powerless to stop it. It was a reflex that I couldn't control. Abby looked older when she concentrated; I had realised during one of my earlier appointments with her. We had seen a lot of each other in the past two years. She would always frown when she was deep in thought and deep lines would form on her forehead and the corners of her eyes would crinkle.

“You haven't experienced any pain or discomfort?” Abby asked as she carefully pressed her fingers into different parts of my knee and compared the left one to the right.

I shook my head. “It's stiff in the morning and it aches sometimes, but mom said that's normal,” I told the doctor.

My mother was a nurse who worked closely with Abby. She never said it, but I knew that she would have been a doctor too if I hadn't been born. My mother, Adaline Olson, was still very young when she fell pregnant with me—only sixteen. I didn't know who my father was or why he left; all I knew was that Adaline raised me alone. For that reason, I hated him. Whoever he was and wherever he was.

“Well, the bone is still in one piece. That's the important thing,” Abby straightened up and took off her gloves. “I can't give you anything for the aches, I'm afraid,” she said apologetically. “How about when you're working? Everything feeling okay?”

“Yup,” I replied. I stood up from the examination, bouncing a little to prove the improvement in my joint, and put my leg back into my jeans, pulling them up and fastening them.

“That's good,” Abby nodded and smiled at me. “You're recovering quickly.”

“It's been two years since the accident, Abby,” I pointed out. “My knee is healed. I'm back to normal,” I paused for a moment, a little afraid to bring up the one thing that I had been dying to talk to Abby about ever since the cast came off my leg. “I just want to get the rest of my life back to normal too,” I said. “I wanna be doing everything I was doing before the accident.”

“Just because you're knee is healed doesn't mean you're back to normal, Renee. It's not as strong as it was before and may never be again. You need to be careful or you could do irreparable damage,” the doctor warned.

I sighed. “C'mon, doc. When are you gonna clear me for EVA again?” I asked. “I miss it. I feel trapped and useless. I just need to get out there and—”

“Renee,” Abby interrupted her.

“Please, Abby. I think my head might _explode_ if I have to wait much longer,” I begged. I rarely begged. “I worked so hard to get cleared in the first place. The accident wasn't my fault. All you gotta do is sign a bit of paper and then everyone's happy.”

“She already did.” I spun around, startled by Sinclair's voice. I didn't hear him come in. He smiled at me and crossed the room to join the two of us beside the examination bed. He held out a tablet. “Congratulations, Olson,” he said. “You're scheduled to go out with Reyes on Monday.”

I took the tablet from his hands and read what was on the screen. On it were the details of the repairs that Raven and I were going to be doing on the outside of the Ring. I couldn't believe my ears. I had been waiting so long for this and now that it was happening, I felt like I was dreaming. “Is this real?” I breathed.

Sinclair nodded. “Real as you and I,” he told me.

_I don't feel real._

I threw my arms around him and Abby and thanked them both repeatedly. I pulled away, grinning for ear to ear and clutching the tablet to my chest. I looked between my boss and my doctor, barely able to contain my excitement. I was overjoyed. “Thank you so much, both of you,” I said again, taking a few steps back towards the exit. “I promise, you won't regret this.”

“Just go easy on that knee,” Abby said. “I don't want to have to piece it back together again.”

With one last 'thank you', I spun on my heel and jogged out of the room. It had been a long time since I felt this excited. I walked with a skip in my step and a smile on my face. I headed for the mess hall, where I had agreed to meet my best friend for dinner. I couldn't wait to tell him the good. He knew better than anyone how important this was to me. I hadn't shut up about it for more than a year.

The halls got busier the closer to the mess hall I got. Though it was the busiest of the twelve stations, Go-Sci was also one of the cleanest. Compared to the halls of Factory Station, I might as well have been walking through the halls of a grand palace.

I spotted Bellamy immediately when I arrived at the mess hall; leaning against the wall with his foot on it. He was still in his work overalls, but the top half was hanging at his waist, the arms tied to each other to keep it in up. He grinned when he saw me coming towards him—that same contagious smile that I knew so well. My stomach fluttered and I felt a familiar tug in my chest, seeming to pull me towards him. I scolded myself and buried the feelings deep down.

I stopped in front of Bellamy, practically bursting with excitement, and thrust the tablet that Sinclair had given me into his hands. He looked down at in confusion, so I tapped the screen for him and it lit up. His dark brown eyes scanned it and lit up when he realised what it was. His head shot back up to look at ~~her~~ me. “Seriously?” he asked.

I nodded eagerly. “Spacewalker Olson is back in business,” I beamed, shooting the air with finger guns.

“Okay, you're so lame for... all of that, but—”

He stopped mid-sentence and swept me into his arms, lifting me off my feet and spinning me around. I wrapped my legs around his waist and squeezed him. To anyone else, we might have looked like a couple. But anyone who knew us knew that we had never been anything more than the closest of friends, as cliché as it sounds.

Our joyous laughter drew attention to us and turned the heads of the people milling around the mess hall. But neither of us cared. Bellamy set me down and let me out of his death-grip embrace. “Let's eat. I gotta work the early shift tomorrow, but tomorrow night, we're celebrating.”

I nodded to show my agreement. I took the tablet back from him and together we entered the mess hall. We joined the line of people waiting to get their food. Luckily, they had all four of the serving stations open so the line was going down a lot quicker than it ordinarily would when they only opened two.

I saw a sliver of hope, then. Maybe things wouldn't be so bad anymore. I snuck a sideways glance at Bellamy who was standing at my side with his arms folded across his large chest. He had been through hell. He'd lost everything. His mother was dead—floated for a bullshit crime that didn't deserve the punishment that she received—and his little sister was rotting away in Juvenile Lockup. It hurt my heart to think how horrible things had been for him.

Apparently feelings my eyes on him, he turned his head and caught my gaze. He broke into a smile, but I could still see the pain behind his eyes. It was always there. There hadn't been a day that passed since Octavia was discovered that I looked into his eyes and didn't see it. It broke me to see him so broken.

“How was work today?” Bellamy asked, breaking the silence between us. It wasn't uncomfortable, but we both preferred to talk rather than stand in silence.

“Painfully ordinary,” I replied.

We stepped up to two of the serving stations and scanned our ID chips. I was handed my dinner rations through the small gap between the counter and the pain of glass that separated me and Nygel. I flashed the older woman a half-smile that I hoped didn't look as forced as it was. Everyone knew about Nygel and what she got up to. Marcus Kane, the Vice-Chancellor, had been trying to get her for years, but never managed to catch her red-handed or find any real proof that could convict her.

I walked away with Bellamy. “I spent most of the day on Tesla Station fixing one of the generators,” I continued as we made our way across the mess hall. We sat down across from each other and started eating. “We had to switch Factory over to its back-up _again_. It's the third time this month,” I explained. I paused, my hand hovering over my tin plate and clenched tightly around my knife.

Bellamy frowned at her. “You okay? What is it?” he asked.

I shook my head and scooped up a clump of protein paste and spread it on my anaemic-looking bread. “It's nothing,” I said. “I just... I can't help but think about the rising number of power and life support related repairs we've been dealing with the past few months in Engineering. We had to rope in one of the trainees a few weeks ago to help us out because we just had so much shit to deal with.

“And I can't shake the feeling that Sinclair's not being one hundred percent honest with me,” my eyes flickered up to meet his. “Jake had this theory before he died. I'm starting to think that maybe he was onto something.”

“Jake? Your old boss?” Bellamy asked. “What was his theory?”

“It doesn't matter,” I replied dismissively. But it did matter. It mattered so much and I wished I could tell him, but I didn't want to worry him. He already had enough on his plate. I bit off a chunk of my bread. “Roman checked on Octavia yesterday,” I told him.

Bellamy could tell I was trying to change the subject, but he didn't resist. He'd been dying to know how his little sister was doing for a while. “How is she?” he asked.

“He said she's doing fine,” I replied. “But he felt like something was off. I guess that's pretty standard when someone's in prison. And besides, Roman didn't know her before so he's not the best judge of whether she's acting normal or not. We can't expect her to enjoy it in there. She looked well, though. She wasn't hurt.”

Bellamy sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. “I just wish I could be there to help her,” he said.

“You're thinking about her, Bell,” I pointed out. “That's all she needs. That's enough.”

“It doesn't feel like it's enough,” Bellamy murmured.

Our conversation was ended by Joe Matthews stopping at our table. Joe was an engineer, like me. He was only a few years older than me but he acted like he owned the entire engineering department. He was under the impression that he was next in line to be the Chief Engineer after Sinclair was gone—not that that was going to be any time soon. He wasn't even that good of an engineer. He was... average.

Joe completely ignored Bellamy and smirked at me. “I heard you were cleared for EVA again,” he said.

I folded my arms on the table and looked up at him. “I heard you applied to be my replacement,” I retorted, arching an eyebrow and cockling my head to the side. “How'd that go?”

Joe ignored my comment. He was too arrogant to even notice that I was mocking him. “Congratulations,” he said. He leaned on the table so that his head was level with mine. “I was thinking you could stop by my place later and we could celebrate properly. I've got a bottle of my dad's hundred-year-old scotch just waiting to be opened.” He looked scathingly at Bellamy. “Beats cafeteria food, right?”

I tried not to let my disgust and repulsion show on my face. I forced a smile and picked up my bread again. “Thanks, but no. Got a night in planned with my mom,” I lied. I hadn't even seen my mom since the previous morning. Our work schedules rarely synced up.

“C'mon, Renee,” Joe pushed. “You know you want to.”

“Renee is spending the evening with me, actually,” a deep voice said. We all turned our heads and looked at Roman as he approached the table. He stopped beside my seat and put a protective hand on my shoulder. He wasn't usually the protective type, but he knew what Joe was like and he knew how much I didn't like the guy. I viewed it more as supportiveness than protectiveness or possessiveness.

Joe threw his head back and laughed. “C'mon, Olson, I'm way more fun than this _guard_ ,” he said. He was always so critical of anyone who wasn't him.

“She said _no_ , Matthews.” Bellamy said. His voice was lower than usual and one look at him told me that he was holding back from jumping up and punching the crap out of Joe. It was the first time he had spoken since Joe came over. “So why don't you scuttle off back to whatever hole you crawled out of and leave her alone.”

Joe straightened up, puffing his chest out and glaring down at Bellamy. Bellamy stared at his plate, his hands gripping the edges of his tray so tightly that his knuckles had turned white. “Yeah?” Joe sneered. “Why don't _you_ go get your waste-of-space little sister from her _cell_ and float yourself?!” he spat.

Bellamy stood up so abruptly that his tray and his food were knocked onto the floor. I shot up, darting past Roman and Joe, and had her hands on his chest in seconds. His nostrils flared angrily and his hot gaze was now set on Joe, who was cackling behind me. I tried to get him to look away, know he would calm down once he wasn't looking at the conceited bastard. “Bell, calm down,” I whispered softly. From the corner of my eye, I saw the guards by the door walking slowly towards us. I gave Bellamy a gentle push back into his seat. “Ignore him. He's not worth it,” I said.

I spun around and glared past Roman at Joe. Roman had put himself between us. “You ever say anything like that again, Matthews, and I'll make you sorry you were ever _born_.” I threatened.

“Get out of here.” Roman ordered.

Joe walked away, laughing, and Roman nodded to the two guards, letting them know he had the situation under control. The guards stopped where they were and watched Joe as he left the mess hall. I picked up Bellamy's tray and his plate up from the floor and put it on the table. Luckily, most of his food had stayed on the plate.

Roman's hand landed on my lower back and I jumped in surprise, looking up at him. “Are you okay?” he asked me.

I nodded quickly, resisting the urge to look at Bellamy when I knew it was Roman—my boyfriend—that I was supposed to be focusing on right now. _But Bellamy_ _was the one who was_ _upset._ “I'm fine,” I said, even though I wasn't. I just wanted to talk to Bellamy and make him feel better. “I'll see you at my place later on, yeah?”

Roman nodded his head and stooped down to kiss me lightly and fleetingly on the lips. “Congratulations,” he whispered. He didn't need to say any more than that; I knew what he was talking about. He was good friends with Sinclair. “I love you,” he kissed me again.

“Don't pay any attention to him,” I said to Bellamy as I sat back down across from him once Roman left. I reached across the table and put my hand over one of his clenched fists. He flinched at first but soon relaxed. His fingers unravelled and he took my hand in his, staring at a spot on the table so intensely I was worried it might burst into flames. So much for things getting better.

We finished our food (and I moved some of mine onto Bellamy's plate when he wasn't paying attention to make up for what had gone to waste on the floor) in silence. We left our trays on the rack by the door and walked down the hallway without saying a word to each other.

It was much quieter in the halls that it was when we arrived. Several times, I went to say something, but backed out and let the silence continue. In the end, it was Bellamy who broke it.

“I'm sorry,” he said. “I lost my temper.”

“I don't know _why_ you're apologising,” I smiled kindly. “Joe's a dick. It took all my willpower not to _let_ you punch him. I just didn't want you to get arrested.” Bellamy's lips twitched slightly. I bumped his shoulder with mine. He used to tower over me when we were kids, but now we were almost the same height; only a few inches difference. “Don't smile now, Bell,” I joked. “Don't you dare smile. Seriously, don't even think about it. Just don't.”

His smile grew wider and wider until he was chuckling softly and shaking his head. He gave me a friendly shove. “God, I hate you, Olson.

I scoffed. “You love me and you know it!” I countered. _But just not the way I want you to._

We were both in much better form as we crossed the Skybridge onto Factory Station. Only a small section of our station was residential. It took about five minutes to pass through all the industrial sections to get to our residential unit. We lived in the same hall, which was half the reason we were so close. We grew up just a few doors away from each other.

The familiarity of the place that I called home made me feel a lot lighter. I'd had a long day between work and my appointment with Abby and our encounter with Joe in the mess hall. I hadn't realised how tired I was until I saw my apartment door. I knew then that when Roman came by later, all we would be doing was sleeping. I wasn't even sure if I would be able to stay awake until he arrived.

“Renee! Bellamy!” a familiar voice called from being us.

We turned to greet my mom. “Hey mom,” I said. The two of us looked more like sisters than mother and daughter. Adaline was, after all, only in her late thirties and I was in my early twenties. People didn't have brothers or sisters on the Ark—Bellamy and Octavia being an exception, of course, and look how that turned out—but we had been questioned about it before. Adaline just didn't look old enough to be my mother. She barely was old enough to be my mother.

“Hello!” Adaline said happily to the two of us. She laughed when I rolled my eyes at her enthusiasm. “Evening, Bellamy. How are you?” she turned her attention to my best friend—a man who was like a son to her.

“Actually, I'm really good,” Bellamy replied, surprising me with his fervour. He looked over at me. “Ren got some amazing news today that's put me in good spirits for the next week.”

Adaline looked at me with excited eyes. “Abby cleared you?” She didn't really have to ask; she knew that that was what it was about. I nodded and delighted cry burst from my mother's mouth. She drew me into a tight embrace. So tight I could hardly breathe. “I'm so happy for you!” she moved back. “You want to come in for a bit?” she asked Bellamy, nodding at our door.

Bellamy shook his head. “I'd love to, but I've gotta work early in the morning so it's an early night for me,” he moved his gaze to me. “I'll see you tomorrow,” he said.

“Absolutely,” I gave him a quick hug before he retreated down the hallway to his own apartment. I watched him for a few seconds before I was snapped back to reality by my mom opening the door.

“When are you going to tell him?” Adaline asked as she turned on the lights.

“Tell him what?” I asked, pushing the door over and hanging my jacket and light grey beanie hat on the hook on the back.

“You know what,” Adaline rolled her eyes. “We both know how you really feel about him, Renee. You need to tell him.”

I frowned. I hated how well my mother knew me. “Mom, I have a _boyfriend_ ,” I pointed out. “I like Roman. I really, really like him.

Adaline smiled knowingly. “Yes, but you don't _love_ him. You can't even bring yourself to pretend that you do. I see you two together. You've been together for four— no, _five_ years and he tells you every day that he loves you, and not _once_ have you said it back,” she placed her hand over mine and looked me in the eye. “You love Bellamy and you know it. Tell him. Now, before it's too late.”

I shook my head sheepishly. “He doesn't feel the same way,” I whispered, giving up pretending that it wasn't true.

“Baby, you can't know that, not for sure, until you tell him.”

 

 

 

 

 


	2. The Beginning of the End

DESPITE BEING COMPLETELY EXHAUSTED, I didn't get much sleep that night. Roman came over after his shift ended. He spent the night like he quite usually did. I listened to him breathe next to me as I lay there, wide awake but desperately wanting to sleep. He slept soundly the whole night and didn't wake up once. I drifted in and out of sleep, snuggling into him and breathing in his scent. He was always so much warmer than me. It was like having a heater in my bed. I liked it.

He lay next to me now, snoring softly, with his arm draped across my stomach and his face hidden in the crook of my neck. I ran my fingers through his soft hair. It was straight and well groomed, unlike Bellamy's untamed curls. It was a similar colour, however, maybe a little darker. I hated myself for comparing them, but I couldn't help it. _My_ _mom_ _was right_. I didn't love Roman. I cared for him deeply, but I didn't _love_ him. Not like he loved me, and not like he wanted me to love him...

Not like I loved Bellamy.

I carefully slithered out of his arms and sat up. I felt groggy and upset as I stumbled out of my bedroom and into the kitchen. I grabbed a cup from the cupboard above the sink and stuck it under the tap, twisting the stiff faucet. I forced myself to stop thinking about Bellamy and Roman, banishing them both from my thoughts and focused on something else that had been eating away at me—something much more important (and daunting) than the drama of my stupid, cliché love-life.

For weeks, I had been struggling to get a good night's sleep. It was something that had been eating away at me constantly. It took away my sleep and my appetite and my concentration. My mind had been preoccupied with things that I couldn't explain, not because no one would understand but because _I_ didn't understand. It was small things that I had been noticing, both at work and in day-to-day life, that weren't like they used to be.

I couldn't remember the last time that—we being the engineers—had gotten through a single week without having to repair some vital piece of equipment somewhere on the Ark. This week, it was another generator failure. Last week, Wick and I had to crawl through four hundred meters of cramped airduct barely wider than my shoulders to fix one of the major air scrubbers. Repairing and replacing minor scrubbers that filtered the air in smaller, less public places was routine and had always cropped up regularly, but the larger ones that the entire Ark depended on were built to last.

Then there was the rising number of executions. I couldn't remember the last time that someone from the Skybox turned eighteen and was pardoned. They were floating people for stealing a loaf of bread. No one was being given a second chance. It made me worry. Was there really any hope left for Octavia? For Clarke Griffin? There were other things, too. A lot of them I didn't notice until _after_ I discovered the truth.

Just as I raised my cup of water to my lips, a sharp knock on the door behind me made me jump. The water sloshed out of the glass and onto the front of my oversized t-shirt. I cursed, wondering who could possibly be at our door so early. The knocking started again, this time louder and more insistent. Whoever it was was hitting the door without enough force to knock it off its hinges.

“Who on _earth_ is that?” Adaline yawned, appearing in her bedroom door.

“Go back to bed, mom, I've got this,” I smiled. Adaline yawned again. She didn't argue and disappeared back into her room. I marched over to the door and yanked it open. “What—” I started to snarl, but stopped when I saw that it was Bellamy who was standing in the hall. He looked stressed—more so than usual—and his hair was dishevelled and messy. He looked exhausted. “Bell? What's wrong?” I asked.

“I-I'm sorry,” he stammered, running a shaking hand through his hair in an attempt to smooth it down, but instead only made it messier. “I know it's early but I— This couldn't wait.”

I reached out and took his hand. “It's okay, Bellamy, just calm down. Why don't you come in?” I suggested.

Bellamy shook his head and pulled his hand out of mine. “I can't. I can't.” he repeated. “I have to go—I have to look after my sister. I promised my mom that I would, Renee, I can't let anything happen to her. She's my responsibility.”

“What's going on? What's wrong with Octavia?” I asked, frowning. I was growing more and more concerned about Bellamy with every word that came out of his mouth, and now I was worried about his little sister, too. “Listen, whatever this is about, we'll figure something out, okay? I promise, Bell, we'll fix it.”

“We _can't_ fix it, that's the problem!” Bellamy exclaimed. He backed away from me. “I need to go,” he said, and then repeated it several times.

“Go where? Just tell me what's going on,” I insisted, stepping over the threshold of the door.

Bellamy shook his head. “I need to go,” he repeated.

He turned his back to me and started to walk away, but I grabbed his hand and pulled him back around to face me. He stumbled and caught himself when his face was mere inches away from mine. I swallowed and ignored the fluttering in my stomach. I felt dreadfully guilty knowing that Roman was sleeping in my bedroom while I stood in the hallway outside, looking at the man I really loved. My face turned serious and I looked up at him with hard, determined eyes. “What the hell is going on, Blake?” I demanded, making it as clear as I possibly could that I wasn't playing around. I rarely called him by his last name; it meant I was really mad at him.

Bellamy surprised me by moving even closer to me suddenly and taking my face in his hands. His palms were rough against my cheeks from a lifetime of labour. His dark eyes bore into mine and I felt like he was looking into my very soul. “I love you, Ren.” he said softly. “I've always loved you. I _will_ always love you, no matter what happens.”

My lips parted in shock. His words should have brought me unimaginable joy, but instead, all I felt was utter disbelief and unbearable guilt. I hadn't even realised that he had let go of me and sprinted down the hall until he was turning around the corner.

The last glimpse I caught of him was of his back. His confession didn't bring me the happiness that it should have, because it didn't feel like a confession of love. It felt like a goodbye, and I didn't ever want to say goodbye to him.

Still stunned, I stumbled back into her apartment and shut the door. I slumped against the kitchen counter, staring blankly at the opposite wall. Bellamy loved me. Bellamy Blake was in love with me. I had gone years thinking that my feelings for him were unreciprocated and that he would only ever see me as a friend—a sister.

We had always been closer than anyone else we knew. We'd been through everything together—overcome every obstacle together. That's what life had been for us, really; just one, long obstacle course. I knew that I would never have made it through without him and the thought that we had just said goodbye to each other made me feel sick.

I stayed motionless in the kitchen for at least ten minutes, running over everything that he had said again and again. The last time I had seen that look in his eyes—that pained desperation—was when they arrested Octavia and floated Aurora. I knew him well enough to know that he was going to do something _really_ stupid. When Bellamy wasn't doing something stupid, he was doing something reckless, and sometimes he was doing both. It was something that I both loved and hated about him.

Finally, I managed to pull myself together and padded silently over to my mother's room. I peered around the door and saw her lying peacefully in her bed, sound asleep. I went to my own room next and watched Roman's sleep for a few minutes. I was glad he hadn't been awake to hear the conversation.

Part of me hoped that Bellamy had—for some crazy reason—had too much to drink or taken something he shouldn't have and would show up the next day absolutely fine with no memory of our most recent encounter. As unlikely as I knew that was, I didn't plan on saying anything to Roman just yet. Or my mother, for that matter. Adaline would worry about Bellamy, and Roman would just be angry or worried about _me_. So I turned away from the bedroom and shut myself in the bathroom.

As I turned on the shower, I felt a tear escape my eye and roll down her cheek. It dropped off my jaw and fell onto the floor at my feet. After the first, more came. I had no idea why I was crying, but the tears flowed out like rivers. I stripped out of the clothes I had slept in and stepped under the falling water which helped to conceal my tears, even though there was no one there to see them anyway.

“Stay safe, Bell,” I whispered, closing my eyes and letting the thin jets of water wash through my hair and down my face.

 

 

I made it out of my apartment before my mother or my boyfriend got out of bed. I planned on stopping at the mess hall to grab breakfast on my way to work. I was preoccupied as I walked through the halls. It was a long walk from Factory Station to Go-Sci. I kept my head down, staring at my feet and willing them to keep on carrying me forward. They felt wobbly, like they might give out any second.

I knew for sure that Bellamy was going to do something stupid. He might have _already_ done something stupid, and that worried her more than anything else. For the first time in months, I wasn't thinking the declining condition of the Ark. All I could do was hope that he didn't cause any irreparable damage to himself or anyone else. Worst case scenario; he got himself floated.

The thought hit me like a brick wall and my pace slowed momentarily and I caught my breath. My heart pounded in my chest. I refused to let myself think like that. If I lost Bellamy, I had no idea what I would do with myself. Roman, however... It would hurt like hell if anything were to happen to him and I would miss him like crazy, but I could see herself living without him. I didn't feel like I needed him. I did need Bellamy. I needed him so much.

I pushed the thought from my mind, tightening my hands into fists at my sides. I raised my head and fixed my gaze on the end of the hallway. I forced myself to think about something else. My twenty-third birthday was coming up in a few weeks. Bellamy and I always celebrated our birthdays together.

Every Saturday night, without fail, a secret club opened on Factory Station. There was alcohol, there was music and, more often than not, there were drugs. It was kept quiet and it was always the same people that were there. To this day, I had no idea how he had found out about it, but he did. The first time we went there was on my eighteenth birthday and it had become something of a tradition for the two of us.

Roman was never included. Being on the guard, no one would be happy to see him there and I didn't trust enough him not to bring it all down. He was good at his job. He was a _guard_. She knew that he would leave her and Bellamy out of it, but if he ever found out about that place, it wouldn't be long before it was gone.

The Club didn't have an official name because it's attendees were worried that that would raise suspicion among the guards if they heard people talking about it, but Bellamy and I had taken to calling it 'The Cubby Hole'. It was one of our favourite places on the Ark. We hadn't talked about it, but I knew that we would go for my birthday this year. We went for his, earlier in the year, and had a great time. We always had a good time when we were together, with or without drink, music and drugs.

I reached the Skybridge that connected Mecha to Go-Sci Station. I joined the short queue at the checkpoint and fished my ID chip out of my pocket. In the year since Octavia was found, the Guard had gotten much more strict about ID chips and carrying them on your person at all times. Other people probably didn't notice the change, but Bellamy and my mother and I all did. It only took us a matter of days to realise what was going on.

The Council were panicking; worried that there could be other illegal children being kept secret elsewhere. I hoped that, if there were, they were never found. I didn't want any family to go through what mine and Bellamy's did.

I handed my ID chip over to the guard at the checkpoint. He placed it under the scanner and read the details that came up on his screen. He looked at me, recognition filling his eyes. “Hey, you're Renee Olson, the engineer,” he stated.

I nodded with a slight frown. “That's me,” I answered.

“I was talking to Wick yesterday—we've known each other since we were, like fifteen,” the guard continued, passing my ID chip back to me. “He told me you just got cleared for Spacewalks. You were in an accident a couple years ago, right?”

I nodded again, my eyes flickering away from his. I'd kill Wick for telling him that—not that it wasn't common knowledge. Everyone was talking about it after it happened—talking about _her_.

“Congratulations,” the guard smiled. “You must be really happy.”

I forced a smile. “Over the moon,” I said and walked past him. “Nice meeting you,” I called back.

I was halfway across the Skybridge when a loud, juddering roar filled the whole hallway. Everyone stopped walking, including her, and looked around in confusion. Shocked gasps and shouts followed the strange noise and everyone on the bridge rushed to the window.

I was swept up with the crowd and carried over to the glass. I pressed one hand against it to steady myself and peered out to see what had gotten everyone so excited. At first, all I saw was the blackness and the stars and the earth. Then I saw it.

My jaw dropped and my eyes went wide. At first, I thought it was just a small meteor plummeting towards the earth, but as I narrowed her eyes to get a clearer look, I saw that it wasn't a meteor at all. It was a Dropship. I watched with my heart in my throat as it hit the atmosphere and burned through it, leaving a trail of hot flames.

“Bellamy.” I breathed.

 

 

 

 

 


	3. The Innocent Convicted

ONE MINUTE I WAS frozen, staring out the window long after everyone else had moved on. The next, I was running. No, _sprinting_ was a better word to describe what I was doing. I was a blur as I ran along the hall, surprisingly fast and agile for someone with a limp. I went back the way I had just come, completely forgetting about the job I had to go to. Suddenly, Bellamy was the only thing on my mind. I _needed_ to find him and make sure he was okay.

Part of me knew that I wasn't going to find him, but another, naïve part of me just couldn't believe that there was any possible way that he was on that Dropship. It didn't make sense. How? Why? Less than an hour ago, he was at my door going on about protecting his sister, so why would he just leave like that? Going to the ground was suicide and he knew it. He would never leave his sister behind. I couldn't believe that was the truth—I _wouldn't_ believe it.

I reached Sanitation and almost crashed into Bellamy's boss's office door. I skidded to a halt in front of it and pounded the metal with my fist desperately. I heard a frustrated shout from the inside and the door flew open so quickly that I was left slightly startled. I snapped out of it a second later and looked up at the man. “Have you seen Bellamy?” I asked immediately.

The man frowned. “No,” he said. “He was supposed to be here an hour ago.” Renee's gut twisted. Bellamy was never late for work. He had never even taken a sick day. I was about to leave without another word, but his boss spoke again. “If you see him, tell him he better get his ass down here if he still wants to have a job tomorrow.”

I nodded with a vacant expression. “Yeah, I'll tell him,” I promised, but I knew deep down that I wasn't going to find him. I checked his apartment on the off chance that he really was just ill or sleeping off a hangover, but it was empty, so I did the only thing I could think to do. I went to work.

I entered the workshop, bracing myself for Sinclair's stern scolding. I was late to work the day after he gave me EVA clearance. What a way to show my appreciation. But Sinclair wasn't there.

The workshop was completely empty except for me and Wick, who was working on something at the back bench with his back to the door. He didn't even look up when I walked in, and I realised that there were buds in his ears and a wire running down to an old music player on the bench.

I yanked one of the buds out and he spun around. “Jesus, Renee!” he exclaimed. “Didn't your mother ever tell you not to sneak up on people?!”

I shrugged. Usually, I would smile jokingly at him, but I couldn't muster a smile today. “Where's Sinclair?” I asked.

Wick looked at me, concerned. “He said he had something else to do—said it was really important,” he replied dismissively. “Are you okay?”

I nodded. “Fine,” I lied. “Sinclair say anything about the launch?”

Wick frowned and shook his head. “What launch?”

“I just saw it,” I explained. “It was an Exodus Ship—a Dropship—going to earth. I wanna know they sent down.”

Wick's frown deepened. “Why would they send anyone down, Renee? It was probably empty,” he said.

“Why would they send an empty Dropship to the ground?”

I almost told him about Bellamy's strange behaviour earlier that morning and my suspicions that _he_ was on the Dropship, but I kept her mouth shut. There was still a small shred of hope that I was completely wrong and he would show up again at some point, drunk off his face and babbling about how much fun he'd had recklessly breaking the law all day in one of the Ark's hidden bars, despite everything that happened to his mother and his sister.

For the rest of the days, as I went all around the Ark, I kept an eye out for my curly-haired friend. Because I was late to work, all the interesting jobs were given out and I was left with mundane tasks, such as fixing one of the computers in the school which took up my whole morning and replacing light bulbs on Alpha Station.

I passed Prison Station on my way there in the afternoon and noticed that it was unusually quiet. There were no voices; no shouting. My blood ran cold and my face paled as I wondered if Bellamy was in there. If he had gotten himself arrested and was awaiting his execution.

I shook my head to rid myself of those morbid thoughts. I couldn't let myself think like that. I had to believe that Bellamy was safe and alive somewhere. If I thought anything other than that, I would go crazy with worry—not that that wasn't already happening. Not for the first time, I hated how close Bellamy and I were and how much I cared about him. It meant that when I worried about him, it was the kind of worry that ate away at me, distracted me, and had me in a constant state of feeling like I was going to throw up.

 

 

I was exhausted when I got home. I was exhausted from working and I was exhausted from worrying. Worrying about Bellamy. Worrying about how I was going to tell my mom he was gone (if he didn't show up). Worrying about how I was going to come clean and tell Roman the truth that I wasn't in love with him but was instead in love with someone else. _When did my life become so damn cliché?_ I wondered to myself as I unlocked the door and slipped into my mother and I's apartment, removing my jacket.

I got a fright when I realised that she was in the apartment. She was pacing back and forth from the kitchen to her bedroom door. I thought she was working. “Jesus, mom!” I exclaimed, my hand flying to my chest. “You scared the crap out of me!” She turned around and I frowned. She looked scared. “What's wrong? What's going on?” _Oh god, is Bellamy okay?_

Adaline stopped pacing and stood in front of me. She ran her fingers through her hair like she always did when she was stressed or worried. “Something terrible has happened,” she began.

Bellamy.

“Oh, baby, I don't even know how to say this.”

_Bellamy._

“The Chancellor's been shot. Abby has been sentenced to death.”

_Oh._ I felt guilty. Guilty for assuming that it was about Bellamy; for only think about Bellamy and not wondering if someone else was in trouble or hurt—someone like Roman. “Jaha's dead?” was all I managed to say.

My mother shook her head. “Not dead, no. But he's in the ICU,” she explained calmly, though I could tell that she was panicking. Abby was her friend.

“They... They don't think _Abby_ did it, do they?” I gasped.

Adaline shook her head again. “No, no, of course not! She exceeding the maximum medical supplies allowed for a patient, Ren. She was operating on the Chancellor.”

I stood there in silence. I couldn't wrap my head around what she was telling me. I threw my jacket on the sofa and sat down on top of it, my head falling into my hands. First Bellamy went missing and now Abby was going to die? “When?” I asked.

“In the morning,” my mother told me. “Seven o'clock.”

I drew in a shaky breath. It felt like a bad dream, but I knew that it was real. I also knew that I would be handling it a whole lot better if Bellamy was with me. I hated how much I needed him and relied on him. It made me feel useless and weak, two things that I absolutely was not. At least, I wasn't when he was there. Maybe he really was the only reason I wasn't a complete mess all the time.

I closed my eyes and was reminded just how tired I was. Roman was having dinner with his parents so he wasn't coming round tonight. I was glad. I would know that something was wrong and then he would question me until I gave in a talked about it. I didn't want to talk. Bellamy would know that. And there I went again. Comparing them. It wasn't fair, on either of them.

“I need to go to bed,” I said to Adaline. “I'm so tired.” I got up and crossed the apartment. I paused at my door. “If you hear anything about Abby, wake me up.”

Adaline nodded. “I will,” she promised.

I smiled weakly at her and shut myself in my room. I collapsed onto my bed and fell asleep without taking my clothes off, completely shattered and void of energy.

 

 

I woke up early and changed out of yesterday's clothes and into others that smelled fresh and felt clean. My mother was awake, which was unusual. She was almost never out of bed before me in the morning, unless she had been working all night and was only just getting home when I got up.

She smiled sadly at me when I emerged from my room. “Morning,” she said. “Do you want coffee?” she asked.

I shook my head. I thought of Abby and wondered if she got much sleep. I couldn't imagine she did, knowing that she was going to die in the morning. I couldn't even begin to imagine what that was like for her. Would they let her say goodbye to Clarke? I couldn't see Kane allowing that. If Jaha was out of action, then he would be acting Chancellor until he either recovered or died.

I took my jacket off the hook on the door—Adaline must have hung it up after I went to bed—and put it on. The material with thin and light, but I never left the apartment without it. It was a bomber jacket with a forest green body and black sleeves. It kept me surprisingly warm in the cold hallways of the Ark. It always seemed to be cold recently. Would it kill them to turn the heating up?

“Where are you going?” Adaline asked me, standing up from the table.

I sighed. “You know where I'm going, mom,” I said quietly; tiredly. “You should come too.”

I opened the door, but Adaline caught my arm and turned me back around to look at her. I met the eyes that were identical to hers. “Renee, we shouldn't.”

“We _need_ to be there, mom,” I pleaded with her with everything I had. “She needs us to be there. Her husband is dead and her daughter is in prison. I won't let her go through this alone.” I pulled out of her grasp and straightened my back. I was taller than her. My height—the one thing that I must have gotten from my father. “You don't have to come. But _I'm_ going. I'm going to show her and I'm going to show that bastard Kane that she is not alone.”

My mother looked away, and I took that as her answer. I left our apartment before she could get another word out and ran all the way to the airlock.

There were people there already when I arrived, but Abby wasn't. I spotted Kane by the inner airlock door with Shumway. I was filled with anger at the sight of them both. Shumway was a snake and Kane was... well, Kane was just a coward who hid behind the power that wasn't really his. I hated that man with a burning passion that came mostly from my mother. She never told me why she hated him, but never made any effort to hide the fact that she did. _He_ knew that she hated him. And though the feeling didn't appear to be mutual, he didn't seem to care all that much. Our eyes met and I made sure to glare.

Jackson, Abby's assistant, arrived and stood next to me, offering me a small smile. He was a couple of years older than me and had always been kind to me. He looked at something beyond me and I saw anger in his expression for the first time ever. He was always such a calm man. I turned to look and my own face morphed angrily at Kane. He was standing closer now.

“You shouldn't be here, Renee,” he said.

I glared at him. “You don't get a say in where I go, Kane.” I spat. “Abby is my friend. I'm here for her.”

“Have you ever seen someone float before, Renee?” Kane asked me quietly. “It's not pleasant.”

I grit my teeth to keep myself from shouting at him. “Actually, I have. When you floated Jake Griffin, I was exactly where I am now. When will you stop killing your friends, Kane?” I asked. I hoped my words hurt him. He deserved it. He killed Jake, the closest thing I had ever had to a father, and now he was going to kill Abby too. He was orphaning a seventeen-year-old girl. “Have you even stopped to think about Clarke?”

Kane looked away and I felt triumphant. I had hurt him. “It's not too late to leave,” he told me, and then he left me alone.

“Bastard.” I muttered under my breath.

“Jackson,” a familiar voice greeted the man beside me.

“Adaline,” he replied.

She stood next to me and we smiled at each other. I was really glad she had come because I really wasn't sure if I could watch Abby die without my mother by my side. Kane was right about one thing—watching someone float was horrific. Watching the reactions was even worse. I was suddenly so glad that Clarke wasn't there. I could still hear her screams the day they floated her father.

I was the first to see her. She came through the doors, flanked by two guards and with her hands restrained behind her back. She didn't deserve this. Jackson and my mother embraced her at the same time and she whispered something to them that I couldn't hear. As soon as they moved away, I threw myself into her arms and hugged her tight. I didn't want any of them to see me cry so I shut my eyes.

“It's okay,” Abby whispered. She couldn't hug me back because of her restraints, but she pressed her cheek to mine.

“When Clarke gets out, I'll be there for her,” I promised. “I'll look out for her. I won't let anything happen to her.”

“That's enough.” Kane said in a monotone.

_That stone cold bastard._

A guard grabbed me and tore me away from her. There were still tears in my eyes. I blinked rapidly to get rid of them but instead forced them to fall. I didn't care anymore. Two other guards tried to take Abby's arms, but she shrugged them off. She wasn't going to put up a fight. She had too much pride.

Shumway opened the inner airlock door. Abby stopped between him and Kane and stared into the airlock. She looked at Kane, but he was looking at something else. I realised he was looking at my mother. I looked at her too. I had never seen such hatred in her eyes—such anger. I had underestimated just how much she disliked this man, but I could see it clearly now.

_What did he do that was so bad?_ I wondered.

Abby stepped into the airlock. She faced us, her eyes scanning her friends. I shook my head. No. No, this wasn't right. It wasn't _fair_. If anything, Abby was a hero, not a criminal.

“What the hell is wrong with you?!” I yelled. The words burst out of me before I could stop them. “She hasn't done anything wrong! She saved the Chancellor's _life_!” I exclaimed.

Kane gave me a hard stare and I felt my mother's arm around me; an uncommon protective gesture. “Unless you would like to join her in the airlock, Miss Olson, I suggest you calm down.”

My mother's arm tightened and she pulled me closer. I looked at Abby, her eyes warning me to do as he said. Tears blurred my vision. How could one man be so heartless? I couldn't stop thinking of everything Jake Griffin did for me. I spoke to Kane a few days after Jake's execution, after they locked Clarke up. “ _That man was like a father to me_ ,” I had told him. I didn't know why I told him that. I guess I hoped it would make him feel bad, but Marcus Kane didn't have the capacity to feel guilt. He stared blankly at me after I told him and then said, “ _You wouldn't know what that felt like_.” If it hadn't been for Bellamy showing up just in the nick of time, I probably would have been floated that week too.

Then there was Clarke. Oh, Clarke. I didn't care that she was in Solitary Confinement. I wouldn't stop until they let me in to see her. I wanted to tell her myself. I wanted to hold her and tell her it was okay and I would always be there for her.

The Griffins were well respected on the Ark. Both Abby and Jake were on the council and high up in their professional fields. But despite their higher standing in society they always treated my mother and I like friends and equals.

I wanted _Bellamy_. I wanted to have him beside me so badly at that moment. Like, somehow, it would make everything better. Thinking about him made me cry harder. I didn't know where he was. He was missing, and I hadn't even told my mother. I hadn't done enough to try and find him. I had failed him, and I had failed Octavia.

The inner airlock door started to close and I held my breath. I wanted this to just be a bad dream. I wanted it to be someone _else's_ bad dream so that I could wake up and not remember any of it.

“Jackson!” Abby called. He looked up, glassy-eyed. “Use the wristbands,” she said. “There may be a way to reverse-engineer them for communication. Talk to Sinclair in Engineering,” she instructed. I had no idea what she was talking about, but I so desperately wanted to know. “Nod if you understand!” she shouted right before the doors closed.

Jackson did nod and I was glad. Even though I had no idea what Abby was talking about, I was glad that he understood. Maybe it would leave her with some hope while she died. I hated that I had so easily accepted that she was going to die.

Kane, who had his back to us now, nodded at Shumway. The commander moved his hand over the large red button that would open the outer doors and release Abby into space and kill her. _Do something!_ I screamed at myself. But I didn't do anything. I stayed by Adaline, her arm still around me, and wished that Bellamy was there too. I knew I should be wishing that Roman was with me, but I was glad he wasn't. He comforted me with words, which only made me feel worse and made me think about it more. Bellamy comforted me with his presence.

I closed my eyes. I couldn't watch it again. I couldn't watch her body—

“Stop!” the booming voice made me jump and my eyes snapped open. All heads turned in shock. Chancellor Jaha stumbled past me and my mother let go of me, grabbing onto him and supporting him for a moment. “Doctor Griffin is pardoned.” He declared. He moved away from Adaline once he regained his balance.

I watched the relief wash over Abby's face, and then the concern for her Chancellor replaced it. He was clutching his lower stomach, holding a bloody cloth over the bullet wound. It was the first time I wondered who did it. Who shot him?

The Chancellor strode forward and stood in front of Kane and Shumway. Both men looked like they had been caught doing something they shouldn't have, which is exactly what had happened.

“I'll deal with you later.” Jaha said to Kane in angry calm. “Open the door.” He ordered.

Shumway did nothing. He stood there like the ugly rat that he was. I was disgusted by him, and by Kane.

“Open. The door.” The Chancellor repeated, slower this time and with more anger than before.

Shumway did as he was told this time and pressed the button to open the inner doors. Abby walked out and stopped in front of the Chancellor. She looked at him and I could see in her eyes that she wanted to thank him and hug him and cry. I knew that was what I would want to do if I was in her position. But instead, she stayed completely calm.

“I spent twelve hours putting those intestines back together,” she said. “Get him back to bed,” she told the medical staff that had accompanied him to the airlock. She left then, in a hurry, and my mother followed her. I thought about going too, but I left them to speak in private. My mother had always been better at comforting people than me.

I didn't know where Bellamy was, but there was a man who loved me whose whereabouts I did know. The Chancellor was talking to Kane and Shumway and Jackson with the medical staff. I slipped away silently. It wasn't far to Roman's apartment on Alpha Station. I knew he had the day off work and I would send a message to Sinclair when I got there, telling him I was sick or something.

I reached his door and knocked. I didn't have to wait long before it opened. Roman was still pulling a shirt on and his hair was damp. He had just come out of the shower. He was surprised to see me.

“Renee,” he said, breaking into a happy smile. _God_ , he had such a nice smile.

I hadn't been planning on crying, but I did. I burst into tears almost immediately. It wasn't the same silent crying that I had done at the airlock or in the shower after I saw Bellamy for the last time. It was loud and ugly and horrible. Roman didn't hesitate before pulling me into a warm hug and asking me what was wrong. I couldn't speak, I could only cry. I didn't even know exactly why I was crying. What it about Abby, or Bellamy, or _Jake_? I just didn't know any more.

I really missed Jake. I hadn't thought about him much lately, but I really did miss him.

Roman pulled me into his apartment and shut the door. He sat me on the couch and crouched in front of me, holding my hands. “Baby, what's wrong?” he asked me softly, his large thumbs stroking my wrists. My hands looked tiny in his.

I breathed deeply. “A-Abby,” I stammered, still crying. My voice shook as I spoke. “She-she almost died,” I got out.

Roman frowned in confusion. “Abby? Abby Griffin?” he asked and I nodded my head. “How? When?”

“Right now,” I replied. “They were going to float her. The Chancellor was shot and then she used more medical supplies than she was meant to and Kane tried to float her but the Chancellor woke up and he-he pardoned her but she almost died, Roman, she almost died. She almost died, just like Jake did and I—”

“Hey, hey,” Roman cupped my cheeks and silenced my rambling. “It's okay. She's okay, right?” he asked.

I nodded again.

“Then it's okay,” he whispered. “Everything's okay.”

I shook my head and squeezed my eyes shut. “Everything's not okay,” I breathed. I wanted to tell him about Bellamy then. I wanted to tell him that he was missing and that I loved him and that he loved me. But I didn't. I didn't tell him any of that because I couldn't. Because I was supposed to love him, not Bellamy. Instead, I grabbed his face and kissed him.

I was so confused and upset and I just needed to feel some form of human comfort. I kissed him hard and with more passion than I had in a long time. Soon, I stopped crying and we moved to his bedroom. He didn't live with his parents, so we didn't have to worry about anyone walking in on us. We didn't have to worry about noise. We didn't have to worry about anything. I forgot while I was with him. I forgot it all.

 

 

 

 

 


	4. Spacewalkers

THAT NIGHT, I TOLD Roman that I wasn't feeling well in the hopes that he wouldn't come over and spend the night. I didn't want to feel that guilt—the guilt that came after sleeping with him while I was in love with someone else. It had been easier to live with before Bellamy revealed to me that he felt the same way and always had. I could ignore the way that I felt about him and pretend that someday I might have the feelings for my actual boyfriend that I had for my best friend. I always knew, deep down, that that wasn't true. I was sure I would never feel that way about anyone else—only Bellamy.

It didn't work. Roman was just all the more eager to come over and take care of me, especially since my mom was working the night shift in medical. It made me hate myself even more because he was just so... nice. I wished I could just force myself to love him. That would make everything so much easier. But at the same time, I loved loving Bellamy, even when I hated it. It was all so, so confusing.

We spent the evening curled up in my bed, watching an old sports game from one hundred and forty years ago. He loved those and I pretended to love them for him. Roman made me dinner and took it to me in my room. He made sure that my cup always had water in it. He did everything in his power to make me feel better and make sure I was comfortable, which only made me feel worse about myself.

After another restless sleep, I woke up with his arms wrapped tightly around me. He held me so carefully and yet so firmly, like he was afraid to hurt me and afraid to let me go at the same time. I rolled onto my side so I was facing him and traced his jaw with my finger. I had the sudden urge to kiss him, just to prove to myself that I did feel _something_ for him and wasn't just with him for the hell of it. So I did kiss him.

Roman woke up as soon as my lips touched him and kissed me back immediately. We broke apart and he pulled me closer. “You should wake me like that more often,” he said sleepily.

I smiled slightly. I buried my face in his neck so that he wouldn't see that it didn't reach my eyes. I let him feel my smile instead of seeing it. “Maybe I will,” I whispered against his skin. I felt him shiver.

“Are you feeling better?” he asked.

I was confused for a moment and then I remembered my lie the previous night. I nodded. “Yeah, I feel fine,” I replied. We heard the front door opening and closing and I sat up, letting his arms slip away from me. “That'll be mom,” I said, grabbing my jeans from the floor by the bed. I was secretly hoping that it was someone else. That was the real reason why I jumped out of bread so quickly and rushed over to my bedroom door, pulling it open. My shoulders dropped and I hoped Roman didn't notice. “Morning, mom,” I said.

“Morning, sweetheart,” Adaline smiled, dropping her bag on the kitchen table and running her fingers through her long blonde hair. She looked tired—and stressed. And she had been crying. “Are you excited for today?” she asked.

In all of worrying and panicking about Bellamy and Abby, I had completely forgotten that today was my Spacewalk with Raven Reyes. I nodded my head and tried to look as eager as I could. “Yeah, I really am,” I said.

“Just... be careful,” her mother smiled.

I nodded my head, promising without words that I would be. “Are you okay? You seem stressed,” I said worriedly.

Adaline nodded her head. “I'm fine,” she said but I didn't believe her. We were too alike and we could reach each other like open books. “Just a stressful day at work.”

“How's Abby?” I asked, not even sure if she would have gone to work after what happened just twenty-four hours ago.

Before Adaline could reply, there was a shuffling behind me and Roman came out of my bedroom, pulling on his guard jacket. “Babe, I gotta run,” he said, pressing his hand into the small of my back and kissing my forehead. “I'm really sorry.”

“Is everything okay?” I frowned.

Roman shook his head. “No, it's really not,” he admitted. I realised how different he was from me and my mother and Bellamy. When something was wrong, he said that it was and didn't lie and say everything was fine. He was more honest with me than I could ever be with him. He gave me a wary look before pressing an affectionate kiss on my lips. “I'll explain later,” he promised.

I nodded and forced a small smile. “Go. I've gotta get to work anyway.”

Roman grinned at me. “Have a good day. And good luck,” he said. “Don't let that Reyes keep you out too late, yeah?”

“I won't,” I promised.

He kissed me one last time before saying goodbye to Adaline and leaving our apartment. I hurried into the bathroom to shower before my mother said anything. I still hadn't told her that I had no idea where Bellamy was and that there was a chance that he was on earth. Which meant that he was probably dead. The realisation hit me like a brick wall. The air left my lungs and I stared at my reflection in the mirror. _Oh god._ What if he really was dead? The surface of the earth was still simmering in radiation. It was uninhabitable.

The part of me that just wanted to see Bellamy again and hug him told me that he was fine, but the rational side of me knew that I was probably never going to see him again and never going to hug him again. I hit my forehead with the heel of my hand and shook my head. If Bellamy was dead, I would know. I would feel it. I knew that I would feel it. We had a connection that no one could explain. I _always_ knew when he was in trouble, so I would know if he was dead, too.

Adaline had gone to bed by the time I came out of the bathroom. I got ready for work, knowing that I would be taking off my jeans and my tank top to put on her oxygen suit. God, I had missed putting on those suits so much. Even though they were uncomfortable and heavy. I was so excited I actually forgot about Bellamy for a couple of minutes.

Thoughts of him came rushing back however when I saw the spare key to his apartment in the bowl by the door. I sighed and picked it up. I didn't expect him to be home, but I had to check. For my own peace of mind if nothing else. Along the hall, it was quiet on the other side of his door. I knocked, and got no answer, as expected. So I slid the key into the lock and opened it. The apartment was dark. When I turned the lights on, it was exactly as it had been when I was in there the two days ago. The bed hadn't been slept in, there were no dishes in the sink, and the shower hadn't been used.

I rubbed my face and sat on the edge of his bed. The stress of not knowing where he was was starting to get to me. This wasn't about loving him anymore. This was about my best friend being missing and me having no idea how to find him. I looked at the wall across from me where a photo of our families was clipped to the corner of the mirror. I breathed out slowly. “Where the hell are you, Bell?” I said aloud.

On my way to work, after I had finally mustered up the courage to leave my best friend's apartment, I met Sinclair. I was glad I did. I had been wanting to talk to him. “Sinclair,” I said, stopping him even though I could tell he was in a hurry. “I'm glad I bumped into you.”

“Renee, I'm sorry, I have somewhere really important to be. Can this wait?” he asked, already starting to walk away.

“Actually, no. It'll only take a minute,” I said. “I wanted to ask you about the Exodus Launch. I saw it.”

“That?” Sinclair waved his hand nonchalantly. “That was just a routine maintenance accident. We were forced to eject it,” he told me. “Now, if that's all, I really need to get going.”

I nodded, though I wasn't wholely satisfied with his answer. I didn't believe him, for one. As he walked away from me, I considered following him to see where he was going, but I remembered that I had places of my own to be. There was no way I was missing my Spacewalk for _anything_.

 

 

It was even better than I remembered. The stars were brighter and the earth was more beautiful. I felt like I could finally breathe after two years of suffocating. I watched it all from behind the tinted visor of my helmet. A dark blanket of contrasting blacks and yellows and the occasional white, which was shaped as a circle and sometimes a crescent. The stars burned with the brilliant sapphire pallor of electric light, but so much more beautiful.

A few hundred meters away from me on the outside of the Go-Sci Ring was another spacesuit containing an arrogant and sarcastic human being. Raven Reyes was nineteen—three years younger than me—but she acted much older than she was. She had had a similar upbringing to me. Single mother, not much money, not enough food. However, my mother cared about me and would have given me the world if I'd asked for it. Raven's mother was neglectful and emotionally abusive. It didn't show unless you really knew her. She was forced to grow up too fast in order to survive.

There was a black bird painted on the side of her helmet, courtesy of me.

“C'mon, Olson,” Raven said over the intercom. “You're acting like a Spacewalk-virgin.”

I chuckled but got back to work. “It has been two years,” I pointed out and heard Raven's own crackling laughter through my headset.

“I hope it hasn't been two years since the other thing,” she said.

I was glad that no one could see my face because I could feel myself blushing. “I'm not going to dignify that with a response, Reyes,” I said and continued my work on the external electrics of the ship.

“How is that guard boyfriend of yours? What's his name again? Ramone?” Raven kept going.

“Roman,” I corrected. “And he's great. Not that you _actually_ care. You're just fishing for details about my personal life and I know it, Reyes,” I smirked, even though Raven couldn't see it.

Raven laughed dryly. “You see right through me, Olson. So let's just cut to the chase and you can tell me what he's like in the sack.”

I shook my head in disbelief. I should have been used to Raven talking like this by now, but it somehow still took me by surprise and it made me just as uncomfortable as it did when I first met Raven Reyes. “You've heard about the Dropship launch, right?” I said in an attempt to change the subject. To my surprise, it worked. Raven was much more interested in talking about it than her co-worker's sex life.

“Yeah, I heard,” she confirmed. “Some people are saying that it was the prisoners onboard.”

“They are?” I replied, unable to keep the surprise from my voice. It was the first time I had heard that theory. “That's insane. Why would they send a bunch of kids down to die?” As the words left my mouth, I realised something. _Octavia_. If Octavia was on that Dropship, that would explain Bellamy's behaviour. People didn't just go missing on the Ark. It was big, but it wasn't like they could just step out the door and go on a little trip back down to the toxic planet below. Everything made sense now. If the rumours were true, and the prisoners were really on the Dropship, Bellamy would have done anything to go with them and protect his little sister. Which meant that both of them were probably dead—poisoned by the radiation.

“Who knows,” Raven continued, oblivious to my sudden chilling enlightenment. “But the council have been known to do some pretty crazy shit.”

“Sinclair told me it was a maintenance accident that forced them to eject the ship,” I said.

“And you believed him?” Raven asked.

I propelled myself in a circle until I was facing in the opposite direction and looked across to B-Dock. “I didn't. And I especially don't now,” I answered. “There's no damage. You'd think a maintenance accident would cause some damage, no?”

The comms crackled and Red spoke to us for the first time in half an hour. “Okay, ladies, time to wrap it up and come back inside.”

“Aye, aye, sir,” Raven said, saluting for only me to see.

And, as quickly as it had begun, it was over. I was reluctant to go inside, but I knew I didn't have a choice. Unless I wanted to suffocate in my suit. Raven and I finished up and floated into the airlock, landing together on the Ark's floor as the door shut behind us and oxygen flooded back into the small room. Pressurised air poured like smoke from the vents and hissed around us.

“Dammit, Raven!” Red exclaimed on the other side of the inner airlock door. “Wait for pressurisation!”

I rolled my eyes at the other woman, who was already taking her helmet off. I waited until the door began to slide open and then removed my helmet.

“Sorry, boys. Places to go,” Raven grinned mischievously.

I could see the excited glint in her dark eyes. It was stupid, but Raven's eyes made me think of Bellamy whose were a similar colour, only even darker. My smile faded and I felt like I was being pulled out of reality; like I was no longer standing there with the two mechanics and the technician. I looked down, zoning out of their conversation as I removed the large, clumsy gloves of her suit.

I jumped when Eli came behind me and started helping me out of the suit. I smiled at him in thanks. Not just for helping me with the suit, but for helping me snap back into reality.

_Bellamy, where are you?_

“Anyone notice there's no damage to B-dock?” Raven said suddenly, glancing over at me.

“B-dock's restricted,” Red replied. “You know that.”

I scoffed. “What, are they gonna float us for looking?” I sneered, speaking for the first time since coming back inside. I didn't mean for the bitterness to slip into my tone, but it did and the others all noticed.

Red and Eli said nothing.

“Guys, c'mon, an _Exodus_ ship was launched. You're not curious about that?” Raven looked at them both incredulously.

“It was not launched. It was ejected,” Red muttered, uninterestedly. “According to Engineering, a routine maintenance accident forced them to eject.”

I shook my head. “That's the same crap Sinclair gave me when I asked him earlier,” I said. Eli had gotten me out of my suit completely now and was hanging it up with the others. “A maintenance accident that didn't cause any damage? That's a lie and you know it.”

When both men just stared at us blankly, Raven spoke. “Fine, if that doesn't stir you tanks, how about this? Why would they build a Dropship in the first place?” she mused as she and I stripped out of our thermal undersuits and started getting dressed in our own clothes.

“Just slow down, all right? We need to check your vitals,” Red interrupted.

“I'll save you the trouble. I feel good,” Raven replied, putting on the necklace. It was a long piece of string with a raven, made out of scrap metal, on the end. She always wore it, only taking it off for spacewalks Before he got himself arrested and thrown in the Skybox.

“Prison visiting day,” Eli grinned, knowing just as well as Renee how excited Raven got when she was going to see Finn. “Tell lover boy I'll pay him the two days' rations I owe him when he gets out.”

“It was three days,” Raven corrected, half-jokingly. “Hey, stash my gear? I'll come back for it later.”

Eli moved to do as she asked, but Red's voice pulled their attention away. “Okay, Raven, _stop_ ,” he said. “Lockup's been quarantined,” he told her. “Some kind of a virus. There's no visitation for at least two months,” he paused and then added, “Sorry.”

I looked over, seeing the disappointment on the younger woman's face. “Since when?” she asked. Her voice was quiet—almost weak. Weak wasn't something I wouldn't usually associate with the dark-haired girl.

“They put it in place yesterday morning,” Red went on.

_Yesterday morning_. That would have been right after the Dropship launched. My suspicions rose, and I could tell Raven's did too. We both finished getting dressed and said goodbye to Red and Eli. Raven walked with purposeful strides and I struggled to keep up with my limp.

“It's too many,” Raven muttered distractedly. “Too many coincidences.” She stopped abruptly and I was relieved. “It's too many coincidences for me to even consider believing that bullshit about a maintenance accident. Everything that's happened. The Dropship, the fact there's no damage to the outside of B-dock, the _Chancellor getting shot_.”

I found myself nodding in agreement. “I know,” I replied. “But we need to be careful, Raven. Things aren't good right now,” I paused and glanced around to make sure there was no one around to hear. “Listen, Kane almost floated Abby Griffin yesterday morning,” I revealed.

Raven stared at me in shock. “But she's on the Council,” she said. “He was gonna float a _Council member_?” She was as shocked as I had been.

I nodded slowly. “He's done it before,” I pointed out. “The Chancellor put a stop to it just in time,” I told her. “But you know what this means, don't you? It means that no one's safe.” I grabbed her arm and forced her to start walking again. “There were so many secrets being kept at the airlock last night, I could just feel it. There was so much whispering and... Abby said something that really confused me.”

“What'd she say?” Raven asked.

I was about to answer when I spotted Kane at the other end of the hallway. I shut my mouth and Bellamy popped into my head suddenly. I had to ask. “Listen, I'll talk to you later,” I said, moving away from Raven. “Don't do anything stupid.” With that, I jogged away from her. “Kane!” I called.

He turned around and stiffened when he saw me coming towards him. “Renee.” He said. It wasn't a greeting or an acknowledgement. It sounded more like he was telling me to get lost. I ignored it.

“Do you know anything about Bellamy Blake?” I asked. “I haven't seen him in a couple days and he hasn't been home.”

Something I didn't recognise flashed in Kane's eyes. “I don't know any Bellamy Blake, sorry,” he said.

He made to walk away, but I grabbed his arm. He was lying and I knew it. “Yes, you do. There's no way you've forgotten him.” I said, trying not to sound angry but failing miserably. “You floated his mother and locked his sister in a cell.” I spat hatefully. I dropped my hand from his arm before I started squeezing in my anger. “If he's been arrested, I have a right to know. I'm all he's got this side of Prison Station.”

Kane straightened his jacket out and looked down at me. “I told you already, I don't know any Bellamy Blake.” He repeated.

I wanted to run after him and punch him as he walked away from me. God, I _really_ wanted to punch something.

 

 

 

 

 

 


	5. Sins of the Son

I WAS MORE FOCUSED on Roman than the football game playing on the TV in my living room. I didn't know why he loved watching them so much. “You know this game ended one hundred and fifty years ago, right?” I joked. He was stretched out on the sofa and I was half beside him, half on top of him. “Everyone who was in that stadium is dead now. Some of them probably didn't even live to see the bombs.”

Roman chuckled and stroked my cheek gently. “Yes, I know,” he said. “I guess I just like watching different team's strategies,” he explained.

I grinned at him. “Sports nerd,” I teased.

“Maths nerd,” he retorted.

I shrugged. “Maths is useful, asshole,” I pointed out. “There's only one kind of balls for kicking up here in space and they belong to Joe Matthews,” I said, only half joking. I paused and thought for a moment. “And Marcus Kane.”

Roman chuckled and twisted a lock of my blonde, shoulder-length hair around his finger. “Why do you hate him so much?” he asked. “Kane, not Joe Matthews,” he added.

I shrugged. “Why don't you?” I shot back at him.

“I do,” he said. “Everyone does. He's an asshole. But you seem to hate him more than most. I dunno, it just seems... person.” He wasn't looking at my eyes but was instead watching my hair curl around his finger.

I shrugged my shoulders again. “My mom's always hated him,” I told Roman. “She doesn't really hate people, but she despises him. Even more so than I thought.”

“So,” Roman said, “it's, like, a family thing?”

I nodded. “Yeah, I guess it is.”

Roman met my gaze at last. “Kane doesn't like me,” he said suddenly. “I don't know why. He never paid attention to me when I was a cadet, and then suddenly I was his number one target. It was like it was his life's mission to make my life a living hell. I can see in his eyes that he hates me.”

My brow furrowed in confusion and disbelief. “Roman, why on earth would he hate you?” I asked. “Why would _anyone_ hate you? You're too... _nice_ to hate.”

Roman shrugged. “I guess there's just something about me he doesn't like,” he said. “Maybe he doesn't like my attitude or something.”

“Well, like you said, he's an asshole and he doesn't matter.” I said firmly.

We talked some more about random stuff. Roman said he felt like he had seen me a lot more the past few days. He was right. That was because Bellamy hadn't been around. I felt a little guilty when he said it because I realised I was substituting him for Bellamy. I felt like I was using him. Which, I guess, I kind of was. Maybe I deserved to feel guilty.

There was a knock on the door that silenced at us. I looked at the door, not moving, and wondered if I could just ignore it and pretend there was no one in. Roman brushed my hair out of my face and smiled at me. “Answer it, Renee,” he said as if reading my mind.

I sighed and reluctantly got up. As I reached for the handle, my heart leapt. Maybe it was Bellamy? I opened the door quickly. Nope. Not Bellamy. I would've taken the Devil himself over the man standing in the hallway outside my apartment. “Oh,” I said. “It's _you_.”

“It's nice to see you too, Renee,” Kane said dryly.

Maybe we said his name too many times.

“What do you want?” I asked, not even attempting to be polite.

Kane looked past me and his gaze hardened. He had probably spotted Roman on the sofa. “I need to speak with you,” he said. He glared past me. “In _private_.” He added coldly.

Roman cleared his throat and I heard him get up from the sofa. He came over and put his hand on my lower back. “It's fine,” he said. “I gotta go see my parents anyway.” He smiled at me and leaned down to kiss me. “I'll see you later,” he promised. He nodded politely at Kane and slipped past us into the hall.

Kane glared after him as he retreated down the hallway. Damn, Roman was right. Kane really did hate him. That only made me hate him more. People just didn't hate Roman. It was impossible to hate him. He was too perfect to hate. He was kind and loving and selfless and just... perfect.

Kane finally turned his attention back to me once Roman was out of sight. “May I come in?” he asked.

I raised an eyebrow. “Must you?” I asked.

Kane shook his head in annoyance and walked past me into my apartment. I muttered an incoherent insult under my breath and slammed the door. I watched him with my arms folded as he sat down at my kitchen table. He seemed so comfortable in my apartment. What an asshole.

“Do you want coffee?” I asked him in a bored tone.

He thought for a moment and then nodded. “That would be nice,” he said.

I glared at him. “We don't have any in.” I spat.

Kane sighed and rubbed his face. “Stop being difficult, Renee,” he said.

I clenched my jaw and walked over to the table, sitting down across from him. “Don't talk to me like you're my... my teacher or my dad. Because you're neither. If I wanna be difficult, I'll be damn difficult. Got it?” I snapped angrily.

“What are you doing here, Kane?” I asked, wanting to get this over with as quickly as possible.

“Right,” Kane nodded, getting to the point. “When was the last time you saw Bellamy Blake?”

My eyebrows shot up. “I don't know any Bellamy Blake.” I threw his own line back at him.

“Renee,” Kane warned. “When was the last time you saw him?” He asked again.

I drummed my fingers on the table. “It was two days ago,” I told him finally. “He was acting weird. Well, weirder than usual,” I said. I paused. “Where is he?” I asked.

“What do you know about his sister—Octavia?” Kane asked, ignoring my question.

I knew I had to be careful. I knew what would happen to my mother and I if the Council ever found out we knew about Octavia all along and failed to report it. “I know she's his sister.” I said. “I didn't know about her before the rest of the Ark did,” I lied.

Kane nodded slowly. “Did you ever meet Octavia when she was in the Skybox?” he asked.

I nodded my head. “Yeah, I met her once. I visited with Bellamy. That was a year ago, though. They stopped his visitations,” I stopped drumming my fingers and narrowed my eyes. “ _You_ stopped his visitations.”

“You must have felt betrayed when you found out Bellamy had been lying to you for all those years.” Kane said.

I shrugged. I got a distinct feeling that I was being interrogated. “I get it. I understand why he had to lie to me, just like my mother understands why Aurora had to lie to her,” I said. “His whole world was at stake. His sister, his mother. If the truth got out, he'd lose them both.” I looked at him silently for a second or two. “I've answered you're questions,” I was starting to get angry at how calm he was. “Now, tell me where you're keeping Bellamy and wh—” I stopped suddenly and looked away from Kane, focusing on a point on the other side of the room. “You said ' _was_ ',” I realised.

“Excuse me?” Kane frowned.

“You asked me if I ever met Octavia when she _was_ in the Skybox,” I said. By the look on his face, I knew I was onto something. “Where is she now, Kane?” He said nothing. I slammed my hand on the table, startling him. I stood up and leaned across the kitchen table. “Goddammit, you sick son of a bitch, where the hell are Bellamy and Octavia?!” I demanded. He looked at me and his eyes told me everything I needed to know. I stood back and looked at him in amusement that caught him off guard. “Holy shit. You have no idea, do you? You don't know where he is.”

Kane sighed. He knew the jigg was up. “We have a theory as to where he might be,” he admitted.

“Yeah?” I sat down and folded my arms across my chest. “What's the theory?” I asked. He went silent again and I started getting angry once more. “Why are you looking for him?” I asked.

Kane stood up and walked towards the door. “People don't just disappear on the Ark, Miss Olson, but Bellamy Blake is of special interest to the Council.”

I jumped up and stood between him and the door before he could open it. “Why? What has he done?” I was begging now more than asking. I needed answers. For the sake of my sanity, I needed to know what Bellamy had done.

It was Kane's turn to look amused. His amusement made me feel sick. When he opened his mouth, the words that came out were the last ones I expected and they left me with my jaw hanging open in utter shock. “He shot the Chancellor.”

 

 

_Bellamy and I ran through the halls. He was taller than me back then and I didn't have a limp. I was faster than him, despite being smaller._

“ _I beat you!” I boasted as we skidded to a halt outside my apartment._

“ _No way!” Bellamy argued. “That was a draw!”_

_I pinched his arm. “Don't be such a sore loser, Bell,” I teased._

_Bellamy pushed me and stuck out his tongue. “You're so_ childish _,” I said, calling him what my mother called me a few days before. I grinned proudly._

_Bellamy rolled his eyes. “Come over,” he said. “My mom found a new book at the Exchange and she said she'd read to us both. It's called the Oh-dies-ee,” he told me, hopelessly butchering the name of the book, though neither of us knew that at the time, being only six years old._

_I agreed without hesitation and followed him to the end of the hall. His apartment was the last door. He opened it and we both bounded inside, dropping out school bags on the floor. I stopped when I saw my mom sitting at the table with Aurora, Bellamy's mom._

“ _Mom, mom! Can you read us the book?” he asked hopefully._

_He was oblivious when he was young—so, so oblivious. I walked over to my mom and climbed onto her knee. She hugged me close. “Mommy, what's going on?” I asked quietly, not wanting my best friend to hear me._

“ _Bellamy, why don't you sit down?” my ~~mum~~ mom suggested._

_Bellamy frowned. “I don't wanna sit down,” he said._

“ _Sit down, Bellamy.” Aurora said sternly._

_He did as he was told this time and sat on the chair at the head of the table, looking between the two women in confusion, who were looking at each other. I could tell that something was wrong, but Bellamy just seemed to think they were angry at him for something, which wasn't unusual. He was quite a mischevious six-year-old._

“ _I have some very important news,” Aurora stated, very business-like, not like she was talking to friends and family. “I'm having another baby,” she told us._

_I frowned and looked up at my mom. “I thought you were only allowed one?” I said, confused._

_My mom nodded. “You are,” she confirmed, exchanging a glance with Aurora. “That's why you can't tell anyone,” she said. “We have to keep it a secret, or they'll take Aurora and the baby away.”_

“ _Take them where?” Bellamy asked suddenly, his eyes wide and full of panic._

_Aurora reached out and took her son's small hand. “That's not important,” she said. “But it's very important that you don't tell anyone about this, okay? None of your friends at school, none of your teachers. Okay? No one. Is that clear?”_

_Bellamy nodded, and so did I. “We understand,” I said, speaking for the both of us._

“ _Your mom's gonna need your help a lot more now, Bellamy,” my mom said. “You need to be ready for a rough few years ahead of you. But we're gonna be here too—me and Ren. We're going to help you both,” she smiled at her best friend and the little boy. “We're here for you. Always.”_

 


	6. The Good Doctor

IT HAD BEEN THREE days since I had last seen Bellamy and I was almost certain that he was on the Dropship when it launched. The theory that the juvenile delinquents were onboard was becoming more and more probably, especially after my chat with Kane the previous night. Roman asked me later what it was about and I just told him that he was trying to apologise to me for trying to float Abby and threatening to float me too. I felt like Roman knew I was lying, but he didn't say anything if he did.

It was odd going to the mess hall without Bellamy, but Adaline was working late and I couldn't be bothered to make myself dinner, so I went to the mess hall. We could afford to choose now that I had a job too. And now that I was on EVA again, I was getting a little extra. Not much, but enough to make us comfortable.

“Renee!” Raven called, jogging over to me outside the mess hall. We walked in together. “Kane was looking for you yesterday,” she told me.

“I know. He came to my apartment and started asking a whole bunch of questions about Bellamy,” I said.

“Bellamy Blake?” Raven asked. “Why'd he want to know about him? They found his sister a year ago. He's just a janitor, right?”

I shot a glare at her. “He's my best friend.” I snapped.

Raven's mouth formed an 'O' shape. “I'm sorry,” she said sheepishly. “I didn't know that. But, still, why was Kane asking him about him?” she pressed.

I shook my head. “It doesn't matter,” I said.

“Uh, yes it does,” Raven disagreed. “Renee, why was Kane looking for him?” she asked me again. I knew she wasn't going to stop until I told her.

“Look, Bellamy—” I stopped and glanced around to make sure no one was listening in. “Bellamy was the one who shot the Chancellor,” I said calmly, quietly. Raven eyes widened and she was about to shout something but I covered her mouth quickly with my hand. “Raven, _shut up_ ,” I hissed. I moved my hand away. “I don't know if it's true. That's just what Kane told me.”

“I can't— I don't— _Why_?” Raven spluttered.

I shrugged. “He didn't tell me that part,” I said. “Listen, I think the rumours about the delinquents being on the Dropship might be true,” I admitted. “I think, maybe, Bellamy snuck onto the Dropship to go down to earth with Octavia—his sister. He'd do anything for her, including going down to a radioactive planet to protect her. I also think that— _if_ he shot the Chancellor—it had something to do with that too.”

Raven frowned. “I went over to Prisoner Station yesterday after we talked. The airducts were open and it was... so quiet,” she said. I remembered noticing the strange silence a few days ago too. “I don't believe the quarantine story. Not one bit.”

I didn't want either of us to be right. I just wanted everything to go back to the way they were before all of this. Before Bellamy admitted his feelings to me and before Octavia was discovered. “We need to be discrete,” I said. “We have no idea what's going on here, Raven, and we could very easily uncover something that could get us in a lot of trouble. The Council is keeping a secret—one that they might _float_ us to keep. Keep that in mind.”

Raven was already losing interest in what I was saying. “Excuse me!” she called, brushing past me. “Doctor Griffin.”

So much for being discrete. I followed her over to where Abby and Jackson stood on the other side of the mess hall. I smiled at them both in greeting, apologising in advance for everything that was about to be said. I had no idea what was going to come out of Raven's mouth—or mine for that matter.

“I have a question about the quarantine,” Raven said. “My boyfriend's in lockup. I went to go see him. Instead, I saw an open air duct. Now, if there really was a virus, wouldn't you move to contain the airflow?” she challenged.

I could tell instantly that Abby was getting uncomfortable. She was a quick thinker, however, and flashed a polite smile at the mechanic. “The virus isn't airborne,” she explained. “That's why the ducts are open.”

Raven paused and I saw the desperation in her eyes. I knew what that was like. She was so desperate to know if Finn was okay, just like I was desperate to know if Bellamy was okay. “Can you tell me if he's okay?” she asked.

Abby shook her head. “I can't. I'm sorry,” she said.

I was suddenly angry with her. I couldn't remember ever being angry with her before, but I was really fed up with people lying and not giving straight answers. First Kane, and now her. “No, you're not.” I snapped, taking both Abby and Jackson by surprise. I felt bad for a moment, and then I remembered why I was mad. “First the Dropship, now this. The Council is hiding something.” I glanced at Raven. “And we're gonna find out what it is. _Whatever it takes_.” I grabbed Raven's arm and pulled her away then. “I'm not stopping until I know exactly who was on that Dropship.” I muttered under my breath.

I did feel a little guilty for treating Abby like that, but at the same time, I just didn't care. All I cared about was Bellamy and whether or not he was okay. I was worried about Octavia now, too. If the ground was survivable, and that was unlikely, what was it like down there? With all those criminals? Bellamy would protect her. Clarke would probably be looking after them all, too. That was just the kind of person she was.

_Oh god_. I hadn't even thought about the fact that Clarke would have been on the Dropship too. I felt even worse then for getting angry with Abby and snapping at her. Raven and I weren't the only ones missing someone we loved. Were the Council in contact with the delinquents? Did they know if they were okay?

I was more determined than ever to uncover the truth.

 


	7. Lies and Secrets Revealed

“I MISSED YOU LAST night,” Adaline said. I had only just finished getting ready for work and we were sitting across from each other at the kitchen table, eating breakfast together for the first time in forever. We rarely ate together anymore. We rarely _spend time_ together anymore.

“I was at Roman's right up until curfew,” I lied. I was with Raven. I knew if I told my mother that, she'd want details about what we were doing and what we were talking about. It wasn't that she didn't like Raven—she didn't trust her not to drag me into some kind of trouble. She was right to be worried. Raven was and had always been a very bad influence on me, not that I really cared that much. We had fun.

“I was speaking to him yesterday,” Adaline revealed suddenly. I was a little surprised since they didn't often exchange any words other than 'hello' and 'goodbye'. “I bumped into him at the Exchange. He said he's worried about you. He's seen more of you the past few days but he said you've seemed more distant than usual. Like you're only there with him physically... mentally, you're off somewhere else. I have to agree with him,” she admitted.

I breathed deeply. “I'm just tired,” I said. “Work's been stressful.”

“Are you sure that's all?” Adaline asked, frowning lightly. She seemed reluctant to say something, but she said it anyway. “Have you fallen out with Bellamy?” she asked me.

I stared at her, my spoon halfway to my mouth. “Um... no?” I said. I started panicking. _Don't start talking about Bellamy, don't start talking about Bellamy_ , I pleaded silently. I wasn't in luck.

“I can't remember the last time I saw him. He's usually around more than Roman, but the last few days...” her frown deepened. “Does this have something to do with what we talked about the other day?” she asked. “About your feelings for him?”

I screwed my eyes shut and pinched the bridge of my nose. “Mom, I really don't wanna talk about this,” I said.

Adaline pushed her breakfast away from her. She was getting angry with me, which was rare. “Renee, what is going on with you?” she demanded. “I want to know, _right now_.”

I stood up abruptly and put what was left of my food on the kitchen counter. “It's nothing, mom, just drop it,” I grumbled. “It has nothing to do with you.”

“Yes it does,” Adaline insisted. “I'm your mother.”

I sighed. I so wanted to tell her everything about Bellamy and Octavia and the Dropship and just... _everything_. But I knew I couldn't. “Something strange is going on—something the Council doesn't want us to know about,” I told her. “I'm just trying to figure it out.”

My mother looked down. “You should stay out of it,” she said.

“I can't,” I admitted. I pulled my jacket on and opened to door. “I'll see you later,” I mumbled.

“Renee, wait.” Adaline came over to the door and hugged me tightly. “Be careful, baby,” she whispered.

“I will be,” I promised and left, hearing her shut the door behind me.

Several work orders had been called in. Wick and I split them between us, since we were the only ones that had checked them, and I set out on my way to the equipment store. I was about to swipe my ID chip across the scanner when I spotted Sinclair heading in the same direction he was the other day when I stopped him. He was in a hurry again and he was staring at something on his tablet.

I hesitated, ID chip in hand. Finally, after a few seconds, I decided that the faulty machinery on Farm Station could wait another twenty minutes. Sinclair couldn't be going far. I followed him at a distance. He was far too distracted by whatever was on his tablet to realise that someone was following him, anyway.

I followed him all the way to the farthest corner of Go-Sci Station. I didn't think I had ever actually been down there. He disappeared through a set of doors and I read the sign above them. _Earth Monitoring_ was engraved into the plaque. The kit in that room was ancient. What on earth could he be doing—

_Oh._

I was certain then that the rumours were true. I slipped out of the abandoned hallway and stopped when I reached the centre of the Ring where Engineering was based. I didn't enter the department, however. Instead, I went along the spoke that had been mostly abandoned since they told everyone about the quarantine.

I stood outside the entrance to Prison Station. It was deserted. I could see a few guards on the other side of the doors, but not nearly as many as usual. The cell doors were all shut. It was so quiet—quieter than it had _ever_ been. I knew for sure that the prisoners were on the ground. Earth Monitoring was in use again, so they were at least trying to contact them. The only thing I still didn't understand was _why_ they sent them down.

I answered the work orders I had agreed to. They only took up a few hours and then I clocked out, telling Wick I wasn't feeling well and I would make up the hours. I wasn't needed in the afternoon, anyway. I went straight to Raven's apartment on Mecha Station after that. I knocked loudly on the door. “Open up, Reyes, it's me,” I called, knowing that she would ignore my knocking and pretend she wasn't home if I didn't.

She opened the door and pulled me in. “Have you heard anything else? Did you talk to Abby? Or Sinclair? Or Kane?” she bombarded me with questions.

I shook my head. “I didn't talk to any of them, no, but I saw Sinclair,” I said. “I figured out where he's been going,” I told her proudly. “Earth Monitoring.”

Raven frowned. “What? Earth Monitoring?” she repeated. “Why would he go there? That room hasn't been used in, like, eighty years,” she said. Her eyes widened. “Oh my god,” she gasped.

I nodded my head. “Exactly,” I said. I grabbed her jacket from the back of her couch and shoved it into her arms. “Come on. We're gonna find out once and for all what the hell is going on on this damn space station.”

Raven frowned. “What are you planning?” she asked suspiciously.

I grinned mischievously at her, and for a moment I thought I was back with Bellamy, telling him some kind of joke. “You're a fan of airducts, right, Reyes?” I said. “There are more ways to get into a room than using the door.”

 

 

“You can go first,” Raven said, wrinkling her nose at the tight, dark airduct.

I rolled my eyes and shoved her out of the way. “I thought you were a badass,” I said.

“Age before beauty,” she retorted.

I rolled my eyes and ignored her. I pulled myself into the narrow metal tunnel. It was hot in there. When Raven crawled in behind me, I could tell she didn't like it. She had probably never actually had to crawl through an air duct before. I couldn't think of any reason that a mechanic would need to. It was a regular thing for engineers, so I was used to it.

“Is it just me or is it hot in here?” she panted after we had been shuffling forwards for a few minutes.

“Just you,” I replied, knowing I sounded impatient. We came to an intersection and I turned left. The maintenance shaft into Earth Monitoring was just up ahead. “We're almost there,” I told her. “Just a few more meters.”

I climbed down the ladder, careful not to disturb any of the loose wires or pipes in the shaft. I could hear voices on the other side of the thin wall. I looked up at Raven and motioned for her to stay silent, knowing that if we could hear them, they would hear us.

I was Jackson's voice that I could hear. “Abby, we have to stop,” he was saying. “The Council votes in thirty minutes.”

“Then we have thirty minutes.” Abby responded firmly but calmly. “Anything from Engineering?” she asked.

“Nothing good. According to Sinclair, even if we sent a signal down, the wristbands weren't designed to receive, so the kids wouldn't even hear it,” Jackson said.

“ _Use the wristbands. There may be a way to reverse-engineer them for communication.”_ I remembered her words so clearly now. She was minutes away from death then and I was still coming to terms with everything that was going on. I didn't even stop to think about what that could mean.

“There's got to be something we missed, something that we haven't thought of,” Abby muttered desperately.

I leaned away from the ladder, trying to see through the vent into the room on the other side of the wall. I wanted to know what they were talking about and what was even in earth monitoring. Was there anything in there that might be able to tell me whether or not Bellamy was alive down there? Or Octavia?

My foot slipped off the rung of the ladder and I fell the rest of the way down the shaft, landing with a thud at the bottom. Raven started to climb as the code was put into the keypad on the other side of the wall. I pulled myself to my feet, even though I knew it was too late to get away. The door opened and Abby reached past me to grab Raven's ankle.

“Hey! Hey!” she shouted. Raven held her hands up in defeat and we exited the shaft together. “Apparently, you two have a thing for air ducts,” Abby said.

The room was larger than I had expected. There were stations all around that had screens showing data I was struggling to understand. The entire back wall of Earth Monitoring was taken up with screens displaying tiles with the prisoners' information. Some of the tiles were dark and the words 'TRANSMISSION TERMINATED' flashed in red across them.

I searched every screen until I found Octavia's face. I smiled. Her tile was still lit up. It showed her heartbeat and her vitals. She appeared to be healthy. More importantly, _she was alive_. About half the tiles were dark, but Octavia was alive.

I saw another face on the board—one that I didn't expect in a million years to see there. I had heard rumours that he'd been arrested, but I thought they were just that. Rumours. Someone messing around because they thought they were funny. Wells Jaha's tile was dark. The Chancellor sent his own son down to die. Perhaps he really was willing to do anything to save our people.

“So this is where Sinclair's been. We've missed him at work.” I mused.

“I'll call security,” Jackson announced, giving me a disappointed look.

“They're not dying.” I said all of a sudden, stopping Jackson and making the two doctors look at her with furrowed eyebrows. Raven looked equally as confused for a moment, but then she seemed to catch onto what I was thinking. We looked at each other for a moment, communicating silently.

“What are you talking about?” Abby asked me.

Raven glanced at the screens. “This is all being sent from the ground?” she queried.

A tense silence enveloped the room. Abby looked at us both, fighting a battle with herself. She knew that it was over. We knew, and if she didn't give us the answers we were looking for, she knew we would tell everyone the truth; that the prisoners were on the ground. The people would not be happy when they found out that the Council sent one hundred _children_ to the surface of the earth to die.

Abby reached behind her and picked something up. “Transmitted by these,” she said, handing it to Raven, who was closest to her.

It was a silver cuff with six needles on the inside. I laughed dryly. I had seen one before, though it had been bulkier, being a prototype. “That sly son of a bitch,” I sneered. I took the wristband from Raven as so many things became clear to me. I turned it over in my hands, able to recognise my own work in an instant. “He told me these were an idea the Council had for spacewalkers, not prisoners they were sending to the ground to die.” I shook my head. “Unbelievable.” I muttered. I threw the wristband back to Abby and she caught it. “They're taking them off,” I said simply like it was the most obvious thing in the world. Which, to me, it was.

“What?” Jackson said, disbelieving. “Why would they do something so reckless?”

“Because we told them not to,” Abby realised.

I laughed. I don't why I laughed. Nothing about what was going on was funny. I guess I was relieved that Octavia was okay and that I finally knew for sure where Bellamy was. He was alive down there. I knew he was.

“You said there was a vote in half an hour,” Raven said, seemingly unphased by the news. It hadn't sunk in for her yet. “What's that about?”

“You two should go. Before someone finds out you're here,” Abby said, ignoring the question.

I folded my arms across my chest and stayed where I was. “What's the Council voting about, Abby?” I asked.

Abby gave me a firm glare. “Go home, Renee. You have the answers you were looking for,” she said. “And remember, if the truth about all of this gets out, Kane will make sure that the two of you are floated for treason.”

I knew she was right. That was what made me shut up and give in. I looked at Raven and nodded. She understood and headed for the door, slipping out of Earth Monitoring. I turned to Abby. “Can I have that wristband?” I asked. “I think you were right. There might be a way to reverse-engineer it to communicate with the delinquents. There's something Sinclair might not have tried—something I put in because I thought it could be used for communication as well as monitoring vitals during spacewalks. That was the prototype, though. It's worth a try, right?”

Abby handed me the wristband. “I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I couldn't tell you about this,” she said.

I brushed it off and inspected the wristband. “Let's hope there's somewhere down there who knows morse code,” I said, knowing that Clarke had most likely learned from her father.

“Renee, I know I don't need to tell you how important it is that you don't say anything about this. To _anyone_ ,” Abby said as I was about to turn and leave. “I don't want anything to happen to you. I don't want your mother to go through what I went through losing Clarke.”

I nodded my head slowly. “I won't tell anyone,” I promised. “Neither will Raven. All we want is to know if the people we care about are alive and safe,” I waved my hand at the screens in front of me. “Now we do.”

 


	8. Recruitment

THE WORKSHOP WAS SILENT and empty. The wristband Abby had given me was in pieces around me and the room stank of the solder I was using. The workshop always had a distinct metallic smell that lingered in the air and clung to our clothes so that when we left, we took the scent with us. My mom stopped visiting me at work because of the small. She said it reminded her of blood. She hated the smell of blood.

I didn't mind the smell in Engineering. I guess I had gotten used to it during the six years I'd been working there.

The door opened and I quickly grabbed a cloth and covered the wristband. Sinclair came in and looked from side to side, scanning the whole workshop. I tensed when I saw that it was him. Did he know that I knew? Had Abby told him? I couldn't imagine that she had.

“Wick said you were ill,” he said to me.

“I was,” I replied, setting the soldering iron back in its holder and turning it off. “Do you need something?” I asked, wanting to pull his attention away from asking what I was doing there if I wasn't well. In truth, I had taken the day off to work on the wristband.

“Someone called in a work order on Mecha,” he told me. “Everyone else is busy. Do you think you could go see what they need? It shouldn't take long.”

I nodded my head. I couldn't exactly say no. “Yeah, sure, I'll go,” I agreed.

“Great, thanks, Renee,” Sinclair looked relieved.

I checked the details of the call after he left and gathered my kit. I stashed the parts of the wristband behind the lockers where no one would find it and interfere with it. I would come back for it later and take it back to my apartment. Sinclair probably wouldn't notice if one of the soldering irons disappeared for a little while. He was too busy with what was going on in Earth Monitoring.

I felt a little better now that I knew the truth. I knew where Bellamy was. I knew why he acted so strangely the last time that I saw him. I still felt uneasy, however. I was still desperate to get to him; to see him; to know that he was safe and unharmed.

I hated what I was becoming without him. I had never been without him before—not for that long. I was realising now how weak I really was and I hated it. When he was with me, I was normal. I wasn't especially brave or strong, but I could get through the day without wanting to curl into a ball and cry until I saw him again. I have become so used to having him by my side that I had become reliant on his presence. Being without him was making me crazy.

That was love, I realised. Love was needing to be with them all the time, but never being able to explain _why_ you needed them. Bellamy had his flaws, just like I did. I saw them and I accepted them.

I got to Mecha Station and went down to an old scrap hold on K-Deck. It was a storage unit, full of useless junk that nobody wanted or needed anymore. Junk that was all more than a hundred years old. Junk from before the world ended that was no longer needed now that man lived in space. Ninety-seven years ago, our species inhabited earth. Our ancestors wiped themselves out, and the small portion of the human race that was in space was all that remained. Now, almost a hundred years in the future, we were going back.

I pressed the buzzer, engaging the intercom. “Did someone call for an engineer?” I said. There was no response. I banged on the door impatiently.

“What are _you_ doing here, Olson?” Raven said behind me.

I looked over my shoulder. She was coming down the hall with a toolbox in one hand. “I could ask you the same, Reyes,” I shot back, arching my eyebrows.

She rolled her eyes and reached past me and banged twice on the door. “Hey, open up!” she yelled.

This time, there was a muffled _clank_ from inside the room and it slid open, revealing Abby Griffin standing on the other side of the door. Raven and I exchanged a confused glance.

“You're the one who called in the work order?” I frowned.

“We need to talk,” was all Abby said. She stepped aside to let the two of us in. Raven went first and I followed, both of us looking around curiously. It was a strange place for a member of the Council to meet with two people like us. It was strange for a member to meet with anyone somewhere like this.

“Look, I already told you. We're not gonna say anything, Abby,” I began, looking at Raven for confirmation. She nodded her head, albeit reluctantly.

Abby turned around and looked at us both. “I believe you,” she assured us. “And you're not in trouble,” she added. “Follow me.”

“Not in trouble yet, you mean,” Raven muttered, slamming her toolbox down on an old container. “This level's off limits for people like us,” she pointed out.

“Not anymore,” Abby shook her head. “You know that we sent the Hundred down to the ground. What you don't know, is why.”

“Enlighten us,” I said, dropping my own bag of kit on the floor and folding my arms across my chest.

“The Ark is dying.” Abby announced without any forewarning. “Life support is on its last legs.”

I stared at her in shock. “Jake was _right_ ,” I whispered, still loud enough for Raven and Abby to hear me. “God, that's why they floated him, isn't it? That's why they locked Clarke up—to keep it a secret from the rest of us.” Everything made sense now.

Abby nodded. “I have ten days to prove that earth is survivable. Or they're gonna start reducing the population. Three hundred and twenty innocent people will be killed.”

“I don't get it,” Raven said. She looked scared. “Why are you telling us this?” she asked, saying exactly what I was thinking.

Abby was trusting us with a lot more than just the secret about the Hundred. She was trusting us not to start an uprising, which we could easily do with this new information. The people from Factory and Mecha and the other poorer, disadvantaged stations would rally together and fight to bring down the Council and all of its supporters. It had almost happened before.

“Renee, I know you. You were like a second daughter to Jake and I know how capable you are,” Abby said. “I looked up your file,” she continued, addressing Raven now. “You're the youngest Zero-G mechanic on the Ark in fifty years.”

“Fifty-two,” Raven corrected, “but... so what?”

“So,” Abby led us around the corner. She grabbed a handful of what I thought at first was a curtain but was actually just a tarpaulin covering something large and round. She pulled it away to reveal an ancient pod. “You have nine days to get this ready so I can survive a drop.”

Raven walked around the pod while I stood back and looked at it. She tapped the front of it with her hand and a hollow bang echoed around us. The thing didn't look like it could survive a drop from a tree, let alone all the way from space to the ground. “God, what a piece of junk,” she said. “They must've found this thing when they,” she paused to pull the second tarp off the back of the pod, “salvaged Mir-3 in twenty-one-oh-two.”

I tore my eyes from the ancient pod and looked at Abby. “You want the two of _us_ to get a hundred-and-thirty-year-old escape pod ready to stand up to the inferno of re-entry in _nine days_?” I asked sceptically.

“Can you do it or can't you?” Abby asked us.

Raven's hand closed around her necklace and her expression hardened with determination. “Hell yes, I can do it, but I'm going with you.” she said firmly.

“Me too.” I added. “You're not the only one with someone on the ground that you love, Abby,” I pointed out. “Those are our terms. Take it or leave it,” I said, earning a nod of agreement from Raven.

“All right,” Abby said. “You can come with me,” she agreed.

“You've got yourself a Mechanic,” Raven grinned happily.

“And an Engineer,” I said.

We got to work. The air inside the pod when I opened one of the doors on the side was stale. It probably hadn't been touched since it was put in there. There was a layer of grime and dust covering everything and I could already see that there were parts missing. It was going to be a job and a half, but I was confident Raven and I could do it.

Raven had Finn to think about. The thought of seeing him again, reuniting with him on _earth_ , motivated her. It was the same for me with Bellamy. And Octavia. I hadn't seen her in almost a year, since the one visit that Bellamy and I were allowed right after she was arrested. I was starting to forget what she sounded like. I remembered her voice being soft... innocent. She was so different from Bellamy and yet so alike in some ways.

I missed Bellamy so much, but I missed him a little less now that I knew I was going to see him again in nine days. _Only nine more days_ , I told myself. I would have to leave my mother behind. I knew there was no way that I could just disappear on her—I couldn't do that to her. I would tell her. Before we left, I would have to tell her, whether I wanted to or not.

“Tell me about Finn,” I said suddenly to Raven. She frowned at me. “I just need you to talk. Just tell me about you and him.”

Raven nodded, understanding how badly I needed a distraction from my own thoughts. “He made this for me,” she told me, holding up her necklace. She smiled to herself and kept on working. “He was the boy next door. We were friends at first. He was always there for me. You know what my mom was like. She took my rations and traded them in for moonshine. Sometimes I wonder if that's the only reason she had me.

“Finn gave me a place to go when she came home drunk. He would sit there for hours and listen to me. He would let me rant about anything and everything and agree with what I was saying, even when he didn't. He shared his rations with me, too,” she said. “He's the only reason I didn't starve to death.” She paused and looked at me through the pod. “You knew, didn't you? About Bellamy Blake's sister.”

I wasn't expecting the question, so I didn't answer straight away. I had been asked it so many times and I had never answered honestly. “Yes,” I said. It felt good not to lie about it. I didn't need to anymore. “Yeah, I knew. I knew before she was even born.”

“Did you know her?” Raven asked. “Personally, I mean. Did you ever meet her?”

I nodded my head and grinned. “I saw her every day of her life,” I told her. “From the day she was born to the day she was arrested.” My smile faded and I looked down. “I was there that day. It was the masquerade dance. Bellamy just wanted her to have a good time... be around kids her own age and not be stuck in their tiny apartment all day. It wasn't his fault, but he blames himself. He always will.”

 


	9. Dark Side

I HAD BROKEN THE law before, but I had never done anything like what I was planning now. I had never stolen before. I had never done anything so reckless. I was doing my best to look normal as I walked through the halls of Go-Sci, on my way to my final destination, but I knew I wasn't doing a very good job. I had probably never looked more suspicious. I dreaded to think what would happen if I was caught.

I turned the corner and almost walked face-first into Joe. I took a step back and cursed mentally. Of all the people on the Ark, of course, _he_ was the one who was lurking in this section. I was pretty sure he wasn't even supposed to be there. I wasn't supposed to be there either, but if anyone asked I would say that I was running an errand for Abby and she would back me up. Of course, then I would have to explain to her why I was there.

“Renee,” Joe said. “Haven't seen you for a while. Where you been the past few days?” he asked.

“I'm doing some work for one of the Council members,” I replied. “She wants my undivided attention on the job to get it done as quick as possible.” I spoke in a monotone, hoping that the conversation would end soon so that I could go.

Joe raised his eyebrows in surprise. “What's the job?” he asked. “And why'd they pick you for it?” I narrowed my eyes at him and said nothing. He shrugged when he realised that I wasn't going to answer either of his questions. “I haven't seen Bellamy recently, either. Where's he got to?”

I lifted one shoulder nonchalantly, but inside I was starting to panic. My heart was racing in my chest. “Why would you see Bellamy?” I asked. “You hate each other.”

Joe shrugged. “I just heard a few rumours about him. Supposedly he's wanted for treason,” he smirked. “People are saying he shot the Chancellor. You know anything about that?” he asked.

I clenched my jaw. “I know he didn't do it,” I snapped. I knew fine well that Bellamy _had_ done it but I didn't want Joe to know that.

Joe folded his arms. “People don't just disappear on the Ark, and yet no one knows where he is. Why would he be hiding if he's innocent, hmm?” There was an arrogant glint in his eyes, brighter than usual. “I reckon Bellamy Blake is headed to the same place as his mother and sister. He was brought up by a selfish woman, so he's become a selfish man.”

_Thwack_. My clenched fist slammed into Joe's cheek. Pain shot through my hand, but I barely felt it. Joe stumbled back a few steps, clutching his face. “I warned you.” I seethed. “I _warned_ you not to say a word against him or his family again.” I took a step forward and raised my hand to hit him again, but someone grabbed my elbow and pulled me back. There was a guard either side of me. I started to panic, but relaxed a little I realised that the one holding onto me was Roman.

“Jesus,” the other guard—Hank, I think was his name—muttered, seeing that Joe's eye was already beginning to swell. “That's gonna leave a hell of a bruise. Get yourself to medical.”

Joe looked between the two of them. “Are you kidding me?!” he spat. “She _attacked_ me! Arrest her!”

Hank raised an amused eyebrow. “Really? Because what we saw was a woman defending herself against her harasser,” he glanced over at Roman. “Isn't that what we saw, Rome?”

Roman nodded, still holding onto me like he was worried I was going to fly at Joe again. He was right to be worried. “There are two ways this can go, Matthews. Either you leave now, whether you seek medical attention or not because, frankly, we don't care either way. Or we can arrest _you_. Who do you think the Council are gonna listen to? Two guards and the daughter of a Councilwoman's best friend, or _you_?”

Joe's jaw tightened and glared at the three of us. “You'll pay for this. All of you.”

“Looks like we can add threatening two guard members to that list of charges.” Hank snarled.

Joe twisted around without another word and marched down the corridor. Roman pulled me away from Hank so we could talk privately. “What the hell are you playing at?” he hissed.

I yanked my arm out of his grip and glared at him angrily. “It has _nothing_ to do with you, Roman.” I spat.

I walked away from him, knowing that he wouldn't follow. I felt bad for taking my anger out on him, but at the same time, he had no right to be angry with me. Joe deserved it and Roman knew that. He hated the guy just as much as I did. Joe was a weasel and everyone knew it. No one would care that I hit him. They were more likely to applaud.

I struggled to find a single flaw in Roman, but sometimes I just got so angry with him for caring about me so much. It was overwhelming. I wasn't looking for someone to protect me—I could do that myself—but that's what he wanted to do. He didn't understand that it made me feel small and weak and I _hated_ it.

I was angry now, which made me much less nervous about what I was about to do. I came to a stop outside the secure storage unit and looked up and down the hallway, making sure I was completely alone. I jumped up and caught hold of the edge of the vent cover, pulling it down. It swung back and forth on its hinges.

I stood under it for a couple of seconds, then jumped and grabbed hold of the edge of the square hole. I pulled myself up, grunting softly from the effort. Usually, I had a ladder to air me with this part. I managed to pull myself into the airduct, breathing heavily as I lay there.

Once I recovered, I reached behind me and closed the vent cover behind me. I crawled through the airduct. I only had to go a few meters before I reached the next vent. I peered through the slats in the cover, making sure that the room below me was empty. When I was sure it was, I pushed on the cover and dropped through the vent, landing in the centre of the secure storage unit.

There were rows of cases and cages filled with spare guard uniforms, shock-batons, restraints, guns and radios. I went straight to the container of radios and opened it. They were piled carefully inside, the hand-held walkie-talkies filling one half of the box and the larger ones that I was looking for filling the other. I took one from the middle so that it wasn't noticeable from the outside of the container that one was missing. I opened the bag I had with me and slipped it inside. It was heavier than I expected.

I turned around and stood under the vent once more. I jumped. My fingers skimmed the edge of the airduct but I couldn't get a grip. I jumped again and missed a second time. I was just about to try for a third time when the door beeped. I froze and looked at it. Someone was putting in the code on the other side.

I snapped back into action. I grabbed the vent cover and closed it, and then ducked behind a case of uniforms just as the door opened and two guards walked in. I stayed low and pressed my back against the case, hoping that they didn't come too close.

“I don't know what to do, Hank.”

I tensed when I heard his voice.

“I've known her for five years and I still can't figure out what she's thinking. I can't read her,” Roman said. He sounded completely distraught. I ached with guilt. I was the reason he sounded that way. He was upset because I took my anger out on him when he hadn't done anything wrong.

“No one can read that girl, Roman,” Hank replied. I heard the snapping sound of a lid being removed from one of the containers.

“Bellamy can.” Roman said suddenly. I had to squeeze my eyes shut. “I heard them talking a few days ago, before he went missing,” he admitted.

I didn't know what to think first. Roman heard us—he heard Bellamy's confession. Roman knew that Bellamy was missing—he knew that my best friend shot Chancellor Jaha. Why didn't he tell me? He didn't know that I knew it was Bellamy, so why didn't he tell me? I was angry again.

“He told her that he loves her,” Roman told Hank. “I haven't told her that I heard them yet—I'm waiting for her to tell me about it herself. I want her to say it. That's the only way I'll know that she doesn't feel the same way about him.”

I heard Hank sigh quietly. “I know you care about her, Rome, but is Renee really worth it? She doesn't exactly treat you like you deserve and you've hardly seen her for the past three days.”

I didn't know Hank very well, but I realised I hated him. I hated him because he was right. He was so right and it made me hate myself more than I already did.

“C'mon, man,” Roman grumbled. “We gotta get back to the recruits.”

I listened to their footsteps. I listened to the door open and close. I stayed where I was, afraid to move in case they came back. I waited for five, maybe ten, minutes before coming out from behind the case of uniforms and opened the vent again. I threw the bag up first this time so that I had less weight to pull up. I was about to pull myself in behind it when I had a thought.

In the heat of the moment, still angry about the conversation I had just overheard, I grabbed a pistol and three magazines and threw them up into the airduct, finally climbing in myself.

 


	10. The Odyssey

I SHUT THE DOOR to the storage unit on Mecha Station behind me. Raven came around the corner, holding a wrench. “It's only me I said. I swung my backpack off my shoulder and held it up. “I got a radio,” I told her. I walked past and placed the bag down by the pod. I removed the radio carefully so that Raven didn't see the hidden weapon.

“Where'd you get it?” Raven asked me as she went back to fixing the seal on the door.

I glanced at her. “It's best you don't know,” I told her. I climbed inside the pod and sat in one of the seats with the radio on my lap. I removed the panel that I had unscrewed the previous day and started splicing the wires.

“That's not worrying,” Raven muttered. “As long as it doesn't get you floated before we launch, it's all good.”

I chuckled. “As long as no one figures out it was me that took it.”

The clanging of Raven's work stopped and she appeared at the door of the pod. “This is gonna work. You know that, right?” she said to me.

I was a little surprised. “Yeah, of course I know that,” I frowned. “I mean, it has to work. We have to make it work. Otherwise, we're screwed and the kids on the ground are screwed.”

Raven nodded and realised that she wasn't trying to convince me. She was trying to convince herself. She needed me to reassure her that we weren't wasting our time. I had been so caught up in my own emotions, I hadn't realised how vulnerable she was right now. She was just as worried about Finn as I was about Bellamy.

“Hey, Raven,” I said softly. I smiled at her. “We can do this. I'm the best engineer on the Ark and you're... well, you're a pretty decent mechanic, I suppose,” I joked.

She laughed and punched my shoulder. “Shut up,” she said.

“I'm serious though. We're both the best in our fields. If anyone can pull this off, it's us.”

Convinced, Raven got back to work. Part of me wanted to talk to her about what I overheard Roman saying. About what Hank said. But I wasn't ready to talk about it.

 

 

It was after curfew when I got home. I made it there without being spotted by any of the guards and slipped inside. My mom was sitting at the kitchen table with her back to the door. She looked back at me and smiled. “I thought maybe you were staying at Roman's,” she said.

I shook my head, hanging my jacket up. “I lost track of time at work,” I told her. Not technically a lie.

“What's this?” she asked.

I looked over to see her holding up the wristband that Abby had given me. I cursed mentally. I must have left it out when I left in the morning. “Uh, just a work thing,” he said quickly. I took it from her and put all the components into the box I had been keeping them in. “Nothing important.”

Adaline chuckled. “Renee, I know I won't understand most of what you say but I'm seriously intrigued. What does it do?” she asked me.

I caved, knowing she would just keep asking me. “It's for EVA. To monitor vital signs. Sinclair's had me working on it for the last couple of months,” I lied. That was what Sinclair had told me when he asked me to help him with it.

Adaline reached into the box and took the casing of the wristband out. “What about these?” she pointed to the thin needles on the inside. “Won't hurt to put it on?” she asked.

I nodded. “Only a little,” I said, though I wasn't sure. “But someday we'll be able to make it smaller. Maybe even as small as a microchip that can be injected somewhere and left there permanently.” I'd had the thought when I was initially building the prototype of the wristband for Sinclair months before. I was going to pitch the idea to him, but I never got round to it. Not that it would have mattered. Everything he'd told me was a lie.

Adaline smiled and put the wristband in the box, placing the lid on for me. “Sometimes I forget how smart and resourceful you actually are,” she said vacantly. “You're just like you're father.” As soon as the words left her mouth, she tensed. “I should go to bed. I have to work early tomorrow.” she rushed out stiffly.

She made to go to her room but I stopped her. “Mom,” I said softly, not really sure what to say to her. She never talked about my father. “You can't just say that and—and leave. Don't you think I have a right to know who he is?”

Adaline sighed and closed her eyes. “Renee, please,” she whispered. “I don't want to have the discussion.”

I let her past. I knew it was useless. Her bedroom door closed lightly and I knew then that I probably wouldn't see her in the morning. She would avoid me for a couple of days until she was sure I wouldn't ask her any questions. That was the way things always went when she accidentally mentioned my dad.

I took the spare key to Bellamy's apartment from the bowl and went along the hall despite the curfew. It was a dead-end hallway. No guard ever came down there. It was still dark and untouched. I was surprised the Guard hadn't been in there to search the place. I guess they didn't need to. They knew where he was. I sat down at the table and ran my fingers over the plastic surface. I had sat at that table just as many times as I'd sat at the one in my own apartment.

I was sitting there with Bellamy when Octavia took her first steps. I was there when she said her first word—which was Bellamy's name. The first time she said 'mom' and the first time she said my name. I sat there with Bellamy when we were sixteen and his first girlfriend had broken up with him. He was never one to show his emotions, but I knew when he was upset. He hurt more than he would ever admit. There were so many memories in that little apartment. It had been my second home.

I didn't know how long I had been sitting there, but eventually, I stood up and wandered through to his bedroom. I had slept in there so many times. Our moms always checked on us before my mom went home and Aurora went to bed to make sure that Bellamy was on the floor. They always knew. They knew before even I did. But every night, we would pretend to be asleep when they came in. He would wait until his mom's bedroom door closed and then he would crawl in next to me and we would talk for hours.

I ran my finger over the spines of the books on his bookshelf. I stopped on one and took it down. The Odyssey. It was one of his favourites. I sat down on the edge of his bed and opened the book, reading through random pages. His mom read it to us when we were younger. She loved to read aloud and we loved listening to her read aloud.

I didn't realise I was crying until one of my tears fell onto the page. I moped it up with the hem of my top and wiped my eyes with the back of my had. I couldn't bring myself to put the book back or leave Bellamy's apartment. So I hugged it to my chest and pulled the bed covers back, crawling in. I lay down and kept reading, letting the words and the memories wash over me. I could just hear Octavia's small voice as the three of us sat together on the bed. Bellamy had taken over from his mom and was reading from the book for his little sister. I just sat and listened. I listened to him and to her. I loved them both so much.

I fell asleep in his bed for the millionth time. But for the first time, he wasn't there with me. He was on the ground, and I was still in space. There was so much distance between us, and yet I felt like he was right there next to me. Talking to me, reading to his sister, laughing with his mom. With me.


	11. Chasing Time

“IT'S BEEN TWELVE DAYS since they sent the Hundred down.”

It was the first time Raven had spoken since I arrived. She had been so focused on what she was doing, she didn't even look up when I walked in. I looked at her now and nodded. “Twelve days. It feels like longer,” I admitted.

“It always feels longer when he's not with you,” Raven said and I knew what she was talking about. She didn't mean Bellamy.

“He misses you, too,” I said.

Raven glanced at me. “Yeah, I know,” she nodded. “I know he does, but it only makes me miss him more.” A smile appeared on her face and she sat back, taking a break from her work. I did the same. “I can't wait to go down. Not just to see Finn again but because... it's the ground. Renee, in two days, we're going to the _ground_. We didn't think we'd ever get to see it and now...”

“I know,” I grinned. “What d'you think it's gonna be like?” I asked.

“Green,” was the first thing that came out of Raven's mouth. “And blue. And... _colourful_. I think it's going to be beautiful.”

I laughed at her. “I've never heard you talk like that,” I admitted.

Raven rolled her eyes. “Yeah, whatever. It's the _last_ time you'll hear me talk like that.”

“Who knew Raven Reyes had a soft side?” I smirked.

Raven glared at me. “No one will believe you.” she pointed out.

“I'll make them,” I shot back, shrugging, and we got back to work.

“So,” Raven said after a long silence. “I've told you about Finn. Tell me about Bellamy.”

I blew out a long breath. “ _That_ ,” I said, “is a long and complicated story. The short version is; he's my best friend and always has been. He's my family.”

“Does Roman know about all this? Us going to the ground, I mean?” she asked me cautiously.

I shook my head. “I haven't even told my mom,” I admitted. “But no, Roman hasn't got a clue. He knows something's up though. And it doesn't help that I'm avoiding him. At some point, I'm gonna be forced to face him and he's just going to keep asking questions until he gets an honest answer.”

Raven frowned. “Why are you avoiding him?” she asked.

I ran my hand over my hair, which was tied up like it always was when I was working. “That's a question,” I muttered. “I feel guilty,” I admitted to her. It felt good to finally say it out loud and have someone _listen_ to me. “I mean, here I am risking everything to go to the ground for another guy—someone that I truly _love_. I don't really want to be with Roman. He's great, and I do care about him, but...”

“You care about him like a friend. A brother,” Raven finished for me. “I get it.”

It felt so good to know that she understood. “He's so damn perfect. I can't bring myself to break up with him because I know he'll be upset. If he cries, I'll cry and then we'll probably just end up sleeping together and I won't have the heart to say I still want to break up so it'll just be pointless.”

We fell silent again after that, neither of us really knowing what to say or _needing_ to say anything. The door opened and Abby came in. She looked different. “How soon can you get this thing ready to drop?” she asked.

“I'm still scraping up parts to fabricate a pressure regulator,” Raven replied. “We got two more days, right?”

“Can we launch without that part?” Abby asked.

“We could launch, but we'll be dead before we get to the ground. And I mean bad dead,” Raven said.

I snorted. “Is there a _good_ dead?” I mused.

Raven flashed me a quick smile of recognition and then continued. “Ruptured lungs, air bubbles in the brain. We need that part,” she said.

“Why? What's wrong?” I asked Abby. “Has something changed?” I climbed out of the pod and looked at the older woman. She was standing with her back to us. I grabbed a rag from Raven and I's pile of equipment and used it to wipe the oil from my hands. “Abby? Everything okay?” I pressed, not sure if she'd even heard me.

“Clarke's wristband signal went out,” Abby revealed.

Upon hearing this, Raven stopped working and stood up. “But... that doesn't mean anything, right?” she said quietly.

“Yeah,” I agreed. “She took it off like the rest of them. Or... maybe it got broken somehow.”

Abby just looked at us both. I could see the fear in her eyes. She had been so sure that she was going to see Clarke again, but now there was doubt. She might get to the ground and find that her daughter—everything that she had left in the world—was dead.

Raven nodded her head slightly, also seeing Abby's desperation. “Okay,” she whispered. “I can get a pressure regulator. Today,” she said, grabbing her jacket.

“How?” Abby asked.

Raven paused. “The less you know the better,” she said. She glanced over at me. “You got this?” she asked.

I nodded my head and grabbed my wire strippers. “I got this.” I confirmed.

Raven left and it was just me and Abby. I had a sneaky feeling about where she was going, but I didn't dare share my suspicions with Abby. I could only hope silently that I was wrong. Raven could get herself in a lot of trouble if I was right, and not just with the Council. There were some people on the Ark that were just plain dangerous and even being in the same room as them is a risk.

I climbed back into the pod and sorted through the loose wires hanging out of the control panel. “Clarke's gonna be okay,” I said, not taking my eyes off my work. “She's just like her dad and she's gonna be just fine. You don't need to worry about her.”

Abby chortled softly. “Yeah, I know that. But it doesn't stop me from worrying about her,” she replied.

I turned to her for a moment and smiled sadly. “I understand,” I assured her.

Half an hour later, Abby had left the messy storage unit to go back to work. She mentioned that Kane knew that she had been coming over to Mecha a lot. She lied to him and he bought it, but she didn't want him to get any more suspicious than he already was. When I heard the door opening, I got up and started grabbing everything we needed to install the pressure regulator. But when Raven came around the corner, she was empty-handed.

“I didn't get it.” she grumbled, chucking her jacket at the wall in frustration.

I sighed and my shoulders dropped. “What do we do now?” I asked.

Raven shrugged. “I spoke to Abby. She's handling it,” she told me. “I could've got it. I know that rat has one but there's no way I'm screwing the chief of electrical,” she growled.

I shook my head. I should have been surprised, but I really wasn't. “I was really hoping you hadn't gone to Nygel,” I admitted. “She can't be trusted, Raven.”

“I know that!” Raven snapped. “But I couldn't think of any other way, okay? I didn't know what else to do. We need that part. We can't get to the ground without it and you know that.”

“Calm down, Raven,” I said smoothly, trying not to let her frustration seep into me. “It's gonna be okay. You said Abby's handling it and that's exactly what she'll do. She might be old, but she's a badass. She'll deal with it.” I put down the tools I had picked up and put my jacket on over my tank top. “I'm gonna go home for a bit,” I told her. “I need to talk to my mom. Explain everything before it's too late,” I pulled the tie out of my hair and put my hat on, my blonde hair sticking out from under the grey wool.

Raven nodded. “Yeah, okay. I could use some time on my own right now, if I'm being totally honest,” she admitted.

“I'll see you later,” I waved goodbye to my mechanic friend and left, preparing myself as best I could for what might be a heartfelt goodbye with my mother.

 


	12. A Hero's Farewell

I DIDN'T KNOW WHEN my mom was supposed to be getting home. I told myself I would wait for half an hour and if she still wasn't home, I would go out looking for her. This conversation couldn't wait. I needed to talk to her before I left, even though the thought of telling her the truth about everything that had happened in the last two weeks made me feel sick.

Just when I was starting to think I would need to go out and look for her, the front door opened and she came in. “Oh,” she gasped quietly when she saw me standing beside the couch. “What are you doing home? I thought you were at work?”

“I was, but... but I really need to talk to you,” I said.

Adaline's happy smile faded and morphed into a frown. “Is everything okay?” she asked.

I shook my head, holding back tears. “No,” I confessed. “No, it's really not. Nothing's okay, mom, and I can't fix it. I'm sorry. I really am sorry, but—” my voice broke and I lost the battle against my tears. They poured down my cheeks and I sobbed quietly.

My mother dropped her things and rushed over to me, hugging me tightly. “Talk to me, baby, what's going on?” she whispered in my ear. Her voice was so soft and yet so full of fear and desperation. I only realised then how worried she had been about me. I hadn't been myself since Bellamy left and I was delusional if I thought she hadn't noticed. Of course she noticed; she was my mother. “Ren, please talk to me,” she pleaded after I continued to cry wordlessly into her shoulder.

“It's Bellamy,” I sobbed. “He's gone, mom, he's not here,” I said.

Adaline pulled away suddenly and looked at me in shock. “Where is he?” she asked.

I wiped my eyes. “He's on the ground. They sent one hundred of the prisoners down to earth to see if it's survivable because the Ark is dying. We only have three months of life support left. They sent _Octavia_ down, mom, that's why he went. He came to see me right before he left and I haven't seen him since.” I ran my fingers through my hair and squeezed my eyes shut. “God, I've wanted to tell you all of this for so long.”

Adaline took my hand. She tried to stay calm, but I could tell that she was having difficulty comprehending everything I was telling her. “Let's sit down,” she breathed. We sat across from each other at the kitchen table. She stared down at her hands. “Just... start from the beginning,” she told me. “And go slowly.”

I nodded and took a deep breath. “Remember the day someone was knocking on our door at, like, six in the morning? You woke up but I told you to go back to bed and I'd get it?” I asked. She nodded her head and hummed quietly. “Well, it was Bellamy. That was the day the Dropship launched. He was going on about Octavia and how he had to protect her and then he told me—” I took a deep breath, not sure why I was so nervous to tell my mother. “He told me that he loves me.

“When I saw the Dropship launch, I knew he was on it. I don't know how I knew, I just did. Just like I know he's alive down there.” I told her everything. I told her about Kane coming to see me—asking questions about Octavia and Bellamy. I told her about Abby and how Raven and I caught her and Jackson in Earth Monitoring. I told her about the wristbands—the truth this time. I told her about the pod and the plan to go to the ground with Abby and Raven.

There was a long silence as my mother processed everything she had just been told. It must have been so overwhelming. She looked up finally and there were tears in her blue eyes. “Why was Kane asking you questions about Bellamy?” she asked. “Why was he so interested? They don't know that we knew, do they? About Octavia?”

I shook my head quickly. “No. No, they have no idea,” I assured her. “He was here because... because Bellamy was the one who shot Jaha. I don't know why he did it yet, but I think it had something to do with getting onto the Dropship.”

Adaline's jaw dropped and she shook her head vigorously. “No.” she said. “No, Bellamy would ever do that. I refuse to believe that he did it, Renee. He just— He just _wouldn't_!” she exclaimed.

I smiled sadly at my mother. “He would,” I began, “if it means the difference between Octavia living and dying. He would do anything for her and you know it.”

She fell silent again. She knew I was right. She didn't want it to be true, but she had to accept it. “You're really going?” she whispered.

I nodded my head. “Yeah, I am,” I confirmed. “But we'll see each other again. As soon as we make it to the ground, we'll radio back up to the Ark and tell the Council that it's safe to come down.” I reached across the table and took her hands. “This time next week, we'll be on _earth_ , mom. And Bellamy and Octavia will be there. And Abby and Clarke. We'll be home—our _real_ home.”

Adaline took her hand from mine and stroked my cheek affectionately. “My darling child,” she whispered and I was shocked. She never usually said things like that—not when she was being serious. “My real home is wherever you are. You're all I have in this world, Renee, and I love you so, so much.” She reached behind her neck and unfastened the oval-shaped locket that she always wore. I had never seen her take it off before that day. “I've worn this every day since the day that your father gave it to me,” she told me.

I was shocked. I expected her to change the subject or leave, but instead, she sat and looked at me, awaiting my onslaught of questions. I was speechless for a moment, but I recovered quickly and it all spilt out. “What was he like? Where did he go? Is he alive? If not, why did he leave? What happened to him? Where is he now? What does he do? Do you ever see him? Do I know him? Do I look like him at all? Are his parents still alive—do I have living grandparents? Does he have a wife? More children? Oh my god, mom, do I have a brother or sister? Does he know I'm his daughter? How long were you two together? How did you meet? _When_ did you meet? Who—” I stopped, realising that I hadn't taken a breath. I was panting a lifetime's worth of questions were finally pouring out of me and it felt good.

Adaline smiled knowingly. “I met him when I was fifteen,” she told me. For the first time, she told me the story of her and my father, but she didn't mention his name once.

They met one night when she was hurrying home from a friend's house. He was three years older than her and on the guard. It was after curfew, so he walked her home to make sure she got there safely. After that, she started seeing him all over the Ark. He would smile at her and say hello. If they were going the same way, he would walk with her. She told me that she “was less in love with _him_ , and more in love with the _idea of him_ ”.

I guess I understood—more than I thought I would. Their story was very similar to Roman and I's. He was older, in the Guard, and it was never true love. I wanted to believe that my parents were meant for each other, torn apart by the birth of a child that my father wasn't ready to raise. But they weren't soulmates. They weren't madly in love with each other. They were teenagers who made a mistake and only one of them was willing to stick around and deal with it.

They started dating a couple of weeks after she turned sixteen. He helped her with her high school maths and she helped him write a personal statement that got him promoted in the Guard. He was good with numbers and she was good with words. They weren't a match made in heaven, but there was no denying that they were a match. They were teenage sweethearts.

“Your father wasn't ready to have a child,” my mother told me, running her thumb over the locket. “He wasn't ready to start a family.” She looked up for the first time since she started speaking and smiled warmly. “You're the best thing that ever happened to me, Renee. I want you to know that,” she said. “As for where he is now. He's alive,” she admitted. “But you not knowing who he is really is for the best, Ren. I promise you, you don't want to know.”

I forced a smile and pretended that I didn't _desperately_ want to know who he was and where he was and if I already knew him. “It's okay,” I lied. “What you've given me is enough. I love you, mom,” I said. That part was true. I loved her so much and I didn't want to leave her. I had to keep reminding myself that it was only for a few days, and when we saw each other again we would be somewhere magical.

A tear rolled down my mother's cheek. It was the first time I had seen her cry and it hurt my heart. Soon, there were tears rolling down her cheeks likes rivers down a mountain. I stood up and went around to her side of the table, wrapping my arms around her shoulders from behind. She hugged my arms and cried into them.

“We'll see each other soon,” I promised. “On the ground. On earth.” I kissed her cheek. “May we meet again,” I whispered. I left then. I didn't want her to watch me leave. I took my jacket and my hat, and the bag that I had packed while I waited for her to come home. There were only a couple of things in it—extra clothes, some of my tools, and Bellamy's copy of _The Odyssey_. I wiped my cheeks, drying the few tears that had fallen.

I had just reached the end of the hall when a door opened behind me and my mother shouted my name. “Renee! Wait!” she called. I turned and watched her run to me. She was still holding her locket. She grabbed my hand and put the cool object into my palm, closing my fist around it and holding my hand for a moment. “I want you to have it. In case—”

“No.” I interrupted. “Don't say it. We _will_ see each other again. We will.” I meant it. I _knew_ it. I held the locket tightly and hugged her one last time. “I love you,” I said again.

Adaline rubbed my back and squeezed me gently. “Go. If you don't go now, I won't be able to let go,” she told me, loosening her hold on me.

I slipped out of her hold and left. This time, she didn't run after me. She didn't call my name. She let me leave, knowing that she may never see me again.

 


	13. facilis descensus Averno

I HAD TO BELIEVE that I would see my mom again. Deep down, I knew that there was a chance we wouldn't see each other again. There was a chance that Raven and Abby and I wouldn't make it to the ground. It was a shot in the dark, really—a suicide mission, much like the one that the Council sent the Hundred on. At least we had chosen to risk our lives to save our people. The prisoners weren't given that luxury.

I went as quickly as I could back to Mecha Station, having already wasted enough time. Not that saying goodbye to the woman who gave birth to me was a waste of time. I just wanted to know if Abby managed to get the part we needed. And _how_ she got it, honestly.

“Renee!”

I groaned, knowing without turning around that it was Roman. I stopped walking and spun around, seeing him jogging towards me. His shout had turned a couple heads, but they quickly lost interest and kept moving. It was the first time I had seen him since I overheard his conversation with Hank in the secure storage unit.

“Roman,” I said. “I've got somewhere to be. Can this wait?”

To my dismay, Roman shook his head. “No, it can't.” he said. He sounded pissed. I didn't blame him. “Why are you avoiding me? What's going on with you?” he asked. In his eyes, I saw some concern, but mostly anger. I couldn't remember the last time he had been angry with me, or if he had _ever_ been angry with me.

I shook my head. “I've just been busy, okay,” I said. “Like I am right now. I really need to go.”

“Does this have something to do with Bellamy?” Roman asked quickly, preventing me from walking away. “I heard him, Renee. I heard him that day he came to your apartment. When he told you that he's in love with you—that he always has been. Why didn't you tell me?” he frowned. He already knew why.

I groaned and combed my fingers through my hair, pulling it a little in my frustration. “I don't have _time_ for this, Roman!” I said loudly. I turned to leave, but he grabbed my arm and pulled me closer to him. “Let go of me,” I warned in a low voice.

“Not until you tell me what's going on with you,” Roman insisted. I tried to pull away but he held me tighter—almost tight enough for it to hurt. “What's going on, Renee?!” he shouted. People were staring at us now. Some looked concerned, others looked amused.

“We're not doing this here.” I said as calmly and quietly as I could. I wanted to scream at him for shouting at me where everyone could see us. I was angry at him for making me feel like the shit person that I was.

“Then where the _fuck_ are we gonna do it, Renee?” he hissed. “My apartment? Yours? Take your pick and we'll go there right now because this isn't gonna wait any longer than it already has.”

I growled in frustration and tried to push him off me but he wouldn't budge. “I don't have time for this, Roman!” I shouted. “You have no _idea_ what's at stake here! Thre are things going on right now that are much bigger than you or me. Now, let. Me. Go.”

Roman shook his head. He looked like he was on the verge of tears. “You really are in love with him, aren't you? This whole time...”

In his moment of realisation, his grip on my arm loosened. I pulled away from him and pushed him back, putting some distance between us. “This conversation is over. And so are we.” I said. I turned around and started to walk away.

I heard his heavy footsteps and soon his hand wrapped around my arm again. He pulled me around to face him. His face was inches from mine and he looked furious. “Five years, Renee. Five fucking years and you couldn't take two minutes to just tell me the truth? After everything I've done for you?” he seethed.

I had had enough. All my emotions boiled over and I exploded at him. “What _exactly_ have you done for me, Roman?” I spat at him. “Bellamy has done more for me than you ever have, but for some reason, you seem to think that you're better than him. That he doesn't deserve me?” I laughed dryly. “You're kidding yourself, Roman, if you ever thought that we were going to last forever. I was just a kid when we met. I'm not a kid anymore. But you still treat me like one.”

“If that's the way you feel,” Roman growled angrily, “then why don't you just go and have you're happy ever after with Bellamy?” he spat.

I wrenched my arm from his grip and glared at him. “Jesus Christ, Roman, this isn't a fucking fairy tale! This is _real life_ and there are real lives at stake! Stop making this about you and me because it's _not_!” I exclaimed. I knew then that it was really over between me and him. The feelings that I had for him, such as they were, were slowly fading away with each word that the two of us said to each other.

Roman didn't look hurt anymore, he just looked angry. So angry. “No, you're right. This is about you and Bellamy. That's what it's _always_ been about. I was just a substitute because you didn't think you could have him, but now that you know you can, you're just gonna ditch me. I know how girls like you work. So go. Go find Bellamy. Go be with that _criminal_.” He spat out.

With that, every shred of respect and affection that I had left for Roman Romero vanished and was replaced with anger and hatred. “That's what I'm trying to do.” I snarled. “Goodbye, Roman.” I stormed away from him, and this time he didn't stop me. I didn't care anymore. I didn't care about him or how he felt. I had never seen that side of him before but I was glad I had. It opened my eyes to something I was previously blind to.

Raven knew that something was up the minute I walked in. She pacing back and forth in front of the pod. It was finished. The only thing left to do was install the pressure regulator. She stopped and looked at me, frowning in worry. “What's wrong?” she asked. “Please tell me Abby's all right.”

“She's fine, as far as I know,” I grumbled. I crouched behind the pod and transferred the gun I had stolen a few days prior from the small, tattered bag I had been keeping there in the storage unit into the one I had taken from home that day. Raven didn't see me do it. I hadn't told her about the gun. I stuffed it behind one of the seats and strapped it down. “I saw Roman,” I told Raven. “We shouted a bunch. And we broke up.”

“Jeez, Olson, that's rough. I'm sorry,” Raven said.

I shrugged. “Don't be. He was an asshole about it and I really couldn't care less,” I said. “Roman and I were never meant to last.”

Raven turned away, not knowing what else to say. I didn't really want her to say anything anyway. Roman and I were done and that was the end of it. I wasn't upset. I was angry. At _him_. I knew that he only said what he said because he was hurting, but at the time I couldn't find it within me to forgive him.

Raven and I were sitting in the pod when Abby came back. She had a pressure regulator in her hands. Raven and I exchanged surprised looks and she took the device from Abby. “How did you—” she was cut off before she could finish.

“Don't worry about it.” Abby dismissed. “How fast can you install it she asked?”

Raven's shoulder twitched uncertainly. “I don't know. A few hours, maybe,” she replied.

“We may not have that much time.”

She nodded firmly, features hardening in determination. “I'm on it.” she turned to me. “Ren, I'm gonna need your help. What do you know about pressure regulators?” she said to me as she pulled herself all the way into the pod and started moving things out of her way.

“Enough to install one,” I answered.

“Good. Let's get to work.” Raven said.

 

 

“Abby.” Raven snapped, looking over her shoulder at the doctor. “How about I pace in the operating room next time you're working?” she suggested.

Abby had been walking back and forth across the length of the room for the past thirty minutes as Raven and I worked. She stopped when Raven spoke and gave us both an apologetic look. I followed the instructions that Raven gave me, since this kind of thing was much more her area of expertise than mine. She was a mechanic and I delt more with electricity and power.

Abby's tablet started beeping loudly and she answered the incoming call. “Abby, did you take morphine from the clinic?” Jackson's urgent voice came from the tablet's speaker.

Raven and I stopped working immediately and spun around to look at her.

“They inventoried already?” Abby asked.

“No,” Jackson replied. “Kane was just here. He's on his way to Mecha to arrest both of you right now.”

Abby frowned. “ _Both_ of us?” she glanced at Raven and us. “Jackson, there's three of us here.”

There was a pause. “He doesn't know about Renee. Nygel only mentioned the two of you.”

Abby ended the call and put the tablet down. I was staring at her in disbelief. “You gave Nygel morphine?” I asked. “You went to _Nygel_?” I looked between the two woman and laughed dryly. “God, one of you is as insane as the other.”

“She turned me in,” Abby hissed.

“What did you expect?” I snapped angrily. I quickly realised that I had no right to be angry with her. I was angry because I was worried about what Kane was going to do to us when he arrived. They would find the gun. That I _stole_. All three of us had broken more than one of the Ark's laws. There was no way in hell that we would be pardoned.

“How much longer?” Abby rushed out.

“Twenty minutes.” Raven replied immediately.

“They're gonna be here in five.” Abby turned her back to us and there was a short silence. “No matter what happens, you launch that pod. Do you understand?” she said.

“We're not going without you,” Raven shook her head.

“Only one of us needs to get the ground, Raven,” Abby pointed out. “The second you find those kids, you radio back,” she instructed. “Three hundred innocent people will die if you don't,” she reminded us, putting her hands on our shoulders.

“Abby, they'll float you,” I whispered. I didn't trust my voice, but I spoke anyway. It cracked and tears stung my eyes.

“Then they'll float me.” Abby said.

Raven hugged her first, squeezing her tightly. Then I hugged her. She held me tight and rubbed my back soothingly, just like my mother did. Abby and my mother were never friends in the way that she and Aurora were, but they were close. I was better friends with the Griffins than my mother, because of Jake. He and I were close. He was the only father figure I ever had.

She pulled back and took my hands. There were tears in her eyes too. “Tell Clarke I love her,” she said to both of us.

Raven nodded and went back inside the pod quickly. I knew she didn't want us to see her cry.

“It's not too late, Renee,” Abby said softly, too quiet for Raven to hear her. “For you to go back home; act like none of this ever happened. Pretend you were never part of it.”

I looked down at our joined hands. “Yes, it is,” I whispered. “I'm seeing this through, Abby. Even if it means getting caught and floated. I'd die for him.” I cracked a small smile, trying to lighten the mood. “Besides, I didn't steal that radio for nothing.”

Abby shook her head and smiled too. “I'm not sure I want to know where you got it from,” she said.

“No, you don't,” I confirmed.

Abby hugged me once more. She was a few inches shorter than I was. I bowed my head, burying my face in her shoulder for just a moment. I squeezed my eyes shut as she let me go. I couldn't watch her walk away, knowing it might be the last time I ever saw her.

She had come so close to floating less than two weeks ago and now the Chancellor would have no choice. He couldn't show favouritism—not now. He was going to need the people on his side in the days to come. They would be angry when they discovered the truth. He would need them to trust him, and what better way to get them on side than floating a member of the _Council_. I wished it could be someone like Kane. Not Abby. Anyone but Abby.

“Renee,” Raven said, making me open my eyes. “I need your help.”

I nodded and joined her in the pod, banishing all thoughts of Abby from my head. I had to switch my emotions off and focus on the task at hand. There would be plenty of times for tears—both happy and sad and relieved—later.

Sometimes it scared me how easily I could just switch it all off. Working helped. It gave me something else to focus on. It made the time pass quickly. It calmed me. My emotional day was forgotten. Saying goodbye to my mother and then Abby, fighting with Roman. Breaking up with him was a good thing. It needed to happen. It should have happened before it did. But I hadn't wanted to fight with him like I did.

When I realised that I was going to the ground, I forgot all my worries about Bellamy. But I still wasn't certain that he was safe. I knew he was alive... but what if he was hurt? What if I got there to find that he was injured? Clarke was just like her mother. She would have become a doctor just like Abby if she hadn't been arrested. If anyone was hurt, she would look after them. If Bellamy was hurt, she would look after him.

Raven twisted the wheel at the centre of the pressure regulator. It was stiff. It hissed suddenly and she started shouting as pressurised air shot out of where the pipes joined to the device. “No!” Raven yelled. “Damn it!” she hit the side of the pod several times in frustration and anger. “She gave us a bad part.” Her head fell forward into her hands. She had never looked more defeated.

I slumped in my seat. “What now?” I asked. “We can't get to the ground without a pressure regulator—not if we wanna make it there alive.” Raven looked at me, but her eyes quickly moved past me and focused on something behind me. A spark lit up her gaze. I looked over my shoulder. There was an old oxygen suit that had been with the pod when Abby found it on a stand. “I don't like that look,” I muttered.

Raven jumped out of the pod. “There's a maintenance airlock not far from here. We can get two suits from there and be back here in less than five minutes.”

I stood up, wide-eyed. “Raven, we can't go out there. Kane—”

“We don't have a choice, Olson,” Raven pointed out. “Come on. We don't have any time to waste.”

She was right. So together, we sprinted out of the storage unit and along the halls to the airlock. Sure enough, there were four suits hanging up beside the inner door. We took one each, making sure that everything we needed was there, and helped each other get them on.

They were heard to run in, but we managed. Thank god that area of Mecha Station was practically abandoned. There were no guard patrols there and we didn't pass anyone. We made it back to the pod in under five minutes, just like Raven said we would, and prepared to launch.

We stood either side of the pod, looking through it at each other. “It's now or never, right?” Raven said.

I nodded my head. “Now or never.” I repeated. “Let's go find those kids.”

Simultaneously, we put on our helmets and climbed into the pod, closing the doors and sealing them shut. We were both beginning to panic. Neither of us wanted to let it show, but it was evident on both our faces. Raven's hands shook as she tied her necklace to the useless pressure regulator and I was blinking too often.

We pressed all the buttons on the control panel so that they lit up and then both looked at the final lever that would open the launch doors and spit us out into space. We didn't know where we would land. We had calculated as best we could and knew that we would land somewhere in what was once North America, but we had no idea where the Hundred were. It could take us _days_ —or more—to find them. We didn't have days.

“facilis descensus Averno,” I said quietly.

Raven looked at me, hearing me over the intercoms in the suits. “What?” she frowned.

“It's Latin,” I explained. “It's a quote by Virgil. It means 'the descent into hell is easy',” I told Raven.

She breathed deeply and put her hand over the lever. “Let's hope so,” she said. Without warning, she pulled the lever. The launch doors open and we began to fall with a deep rumble and the blaring of alarms.

 


	14. Descent

WE WERE FALLING. THE pod was shaking. Alarms were going off.

Raven and I frantically pushed buttons and flicked switches, trying to stabilise the pod as it plummeted towards the ground at break-neck speed. I wanted to scream but I did my best to keep a calm and collected exterior. I could feel the sweat drench my skin, the throbbing of my own eyes and the thumping of my heart in my chest. The fear was like a knife in my gut, slowly twisting.

_Snap out of it_ , I told myself.

I took several minutes of spinning and falling and shaking, but Raven and I finally managed to stabilise the pod and the descent became smooth and controlled. We drifted weightlessly above the green and blue planet. It seemed bigger now, even though we were only a little closer to it than we were before. Still, it was closer than we had ever been to our people's home.

“It's so beautiful,” I whispered breathlessly.

Raven nodded her head. She, like me, was breathing heavily after the panic. “Yeah, it is,” she agreed. She looked away from the window and took a deep breath. “Okay. RCS valve...” she pressed a series of buttons on the control panel. “Open.”

“RCS thrust pressure good,” I told her, reading the data on the screen in front of me.

“Attitude?” she said, looking over at me.

I grinned. “Good,” I replied. “Heat shield... good,” I read. I looked at her again and nodded once. “We're good.”

We both turned to the lever between us. Raven had stuck a label on it with 'RETROROCKETS: KISS YOUR ASS GOODBYE' written in red. “Care to do the honours?” she asked me.

I placed my hand over the lever, squeezing my eyes shut. “Please don't let us blow up,” I murmured. I pulled the lever and the rockets fired immediately.

I swore loudly as flames burst from the control panel in front of me. The pod started shaking again and alarms beeped all around us. I could no longer see the earth out the window. All I saw were flames as we tore through the atmosphere.

Sparks flew everywhere and there was nothing more that we could do but pray the old heap of metal held together and we didn't die. I had to grit my teeth to keep myself from screaming. I clenched my jaw so tightly that it hurt. I gripped the harness that was keeping me in my seat and I thought about Bellamy. I thought about seeing him again and what I would say. I had no idea what I was going to say to him.

Bellamy and I had always been friends. Our mothers had known each other since they were eight years old and they had been inseparable ever since. Our families were always there for each other. Bellamy was always there for me and I was always there for him. Except when he _really_ needed me. I should have gone after him that morning. I should have gotten on the Dropship with him. There were a lot of things that I should have done differently. Unfortunately, there was nothing I could do that would change the past.

I tried to think of all the memories that I shared with my best friend, but there were too many. So I focused on the best ones. Our first day of school. Bellamy was a lot more nervous than I was. We promised each other we wouldn't leave each other's side, but less than ten minutes into our first day, we were separated and put in different classes. There had been a mistake and I was put in with all of the children from Alpha Station. I tried to tell them but they wouldn't listen to the five-year-old child.

We spent our first day of school without each other, but the mistake was corrected the next day and we were back together. We became a duo. We were always Renee and Bellamy; never just Renee or just Bellamy. We made other friends in school, but there was never anyone that just one of us was friends with. We were a package deal and that was a well-known fact.

The first day of high school was a little different. Bellamy was always better at language and I was better at science and maths. We had Earth Skills and Earth History together but that was it. I remembered sitting in Earth Skills one day, listening to Charles Pike talk. I hung off his every word. It was one of my favourite classes. Bellamy was distracted that day. I kept flicking bits of paper at me and poking my face, doing everything he could to distract me. I turned to face him, ready to tell him to quit it before I punched him where the Sun don't shine when he flicked another bit of paper and it hit me right between the eyes.

“For fuck sake, Bellamy!” I had exclaimed loudly and shoved him. I pushed him harder than I meant to and he toppled off his chair, falling on the ground in the isle down the middle of the classroom. He had tried to grab the table to steady himself but only brought it down with him. The whole class erupted in laughter. Pike tried to silence us, but even he was laughing a little. Bellamy was in a mood for the rest of the class and gave me the silent treatment for embarrassing him.

When Bellamy and I were annoyed at each other, that was what we did. We went silent and refused to say a word. The longest it ever lasted was two hours. We just didn't stay mad at each other. We'd had arguments, but we always figured things out on the same day. The past twelve days was the longest we had ever been apart and I never thought it would be so hard.

Raven's voice ended my reminiscing. I couldn't hear her properly over the roar of the rockets and the alarms and the rattling of the whole pod. “...should have...by now...” We looked at each other and she could tell I hadn't heard her. She spoke again and I only caught one word. “Parachutes.”

I knew what she was trying to say. The parachutes should have deployed but they hadn't. We were still falling and if they didn't deploy soon... we would be going far too fast when we hit the ground. I tried to check the systems analysis but the screen was flickering on and off too much for me to read it.

Suddenly, the pod jerked violently. The force of the parachute flying out the back threw me forward. My helmet hit the control panel. I saw the visor smash before my actual head connected with the panel and I was knocked out cold.

 


	15. Reunion

SOMETHING WAS HITTING MY arm. It didn't hurt. The hits were light—almost deliberately light. My head was pounding and I was having difficulty remembering anything. Who was I? Where was I? _Reene Olson. Your name is Renee Olson._ The throbbing in my skull made me want to not open my eyes.

“Renee,” someone was saying. “Renee, please wake up.”

I knew that voice. How did I know that voice? Who did it belong to? I could hear something else. It was quieter... softer. Like light tapping on a metal tin. A groan came from somewhere deep inside me and cracked my eyes open. There was a bright light in my face. I held up my hands, blocking it out, but it didn't seem to help. I realised that the light was all around me.

Slowly, my eyes adjusted to it and I looked around. I was inside the pod. The pod! Of course. I remembered now. I was rebuilding with Raven it to come down to the ground. I was shocked. The pod wasn't moving... and I was still alive... and Raven's was the voice I heard a minute ago. We made it. We were alive and there was nowhere else we could be but on the surface of earth.

I looked to my right where Raven was sitting. She had removed her helmet. There was blood running down from her forehead, all down the side of her face. “You're bleeding,” was the first thing that I said.

Raven reached up and cringed when she saw the scarlet liquid on her fingertips. “Shit,” she muttered.

I took my own helmet off and groaned. My head hurt so much. “Jesus, Renee, so are you,” Raven said.

I touched my head and so that she was right. I chuckled lightly and leaned my head back against the headrest of my seat. “Shit,” I said, just like she had. “My god, Reyes, we actually made it.” A horrible groan came from the door beside me and it was hauled upwards. I stared in shock at the blonde whose head appeared through the opening. “Oh my god,” I breathed.

She was just as shocked to see me. A beat passed and she threw her arms around me. I hugged her back, laughing happily. I squeezed her waist tightly and pulled back, taking her face in my hands. She looked older than she did the last time I saw her. That was only a year ago, but she looked so much older. She was more tanned now, too. I was amazed at how much darker just two weeks on the ground had made her.

“I'm so glad you're alive,” I said.

Clarke shook her head in disbelief. “How are you even here?” she asked.

I grinned. “It's a long story,” I replied.

Clarke helped me climb out of the pod. I stumbled a little, not used to the gravity. When our ancestors tried to replicate the earth's gravity on the Ark, they hadn't got it quite right. It was stronger on the ground I felt heavier than usual. The difference was only small, but I still found it more of an effort to lift myself and move my limbs. It didn't help that I was still tired and weak from the crash. I knew that once I got rid of the oxygen suit I had on, it would be easier to move.

I stood next to Clarke, holding onto her in order to keep my balance. I took a few steps. The ground was covered in leaves. It was soft. I looked around us. For a moment, I was aware of only colours, not shapes. Stripes of blue, green and brown so vibrant my brain couldn't process them. I gust of wind passed over me, making my skin tingle and flooding my nose with scents I couldn't begin to identify.

We had landed in a small clearing. All around us were trees. It was as if all the trees on the planet had come to welcome us home. Their enormous branches were lifted in celebration towards the sky, which was overcast and grey. That was when I realised it was raining. It was fine but soaked the hair that wasn't covered by my hat quickly. Droplets of water ran down my neck and into my suit.

I realised that Clarke was no longer beside me. Then I heard Raven's voice a short distance away. “I dreamed it would smell like this,” she said, stepping out of her suit. She spun around with her arms spread out like wings. She tilted her head back. She stopped when she felt the water dropping on her. She looked at Clarke, shocked. “Is this... rain?” she asked.

Clarke nodded and laughed a little. “Welcome home,” she said.

I shed my own suit, throwing it into the pod, and joined Raven. I grabbed her and hugged her tightly. “We made it,” I said to her.

“We made it,” she repeated back to me.

“Raven!”

She let go of me when she heard her name and turned around. I watched the joy and relief wash over her face. “Finn!” she exclaimed and ran towards the brown-haired boy. She fell into his arms and he caught her, staring at her in shock and disbelief. I grinned as I watched. “I knew you couldn't be dead,” Raven said.

Finn looked towards Clarke and me for a second, seeing the pod behind us and understanding. “You're bleeding,” he said.

“I don't care,” Raven breathed and she kissed him.

It felt wrong watching them, so I looked away. I looked over my shoulder at Clarke, expecting to see her smiling at the emotional reunion. Instead, her lips were down-turned and slightly parted. Her eyes were sad. She looked crushed.

Raven laughed when she and Finn pulled apart, drawing my attention back to the two of them, and hugged him again. “How did you get here?” Finn asked. He still seemed to be coming to terms with the fact that she was actually in front of him.

“You know that big scrap hold? The one on K-Deck?” Raven grinned proudly.

“You built that from scrap?” Finn asked, shocked.

“Please,” Raven scoffed. “Like that's hard. Besides,” she looked over at me and smiled. “I had some help.”

Finn looked at me and smiled politely. “How are you, Sparky?” he asked me.

“I've been better, Spacewalker,” I replied. I hugged him briefly. We didn't know each other well—only through Raven.

“It just needed a couple parts and some love,” Raven went on.

“You're insane,” Finn said, a little amused.

“I'd do more for you and worse. Just like you would for me,” she replied. As she was looking at him, she started to keel over. She would have fallen if he hadn't caught her.

I darted forwards and took her other arm, steadying her. “You need to sit down,” I said, Finn and I leading her over to a rock and helping her to lower onto it.

Finn removed her jacket and put it around Raven, touched her head gently and inspecting the gash on her forehead. “Let me get something for that,” he said softly.

I crouched next to her. “Are you okay?” I asked.

She nodded. “I'm good,” she said. “Just a little dizzy.” She broke into a bright smile. “I can't believe we're here,” she looked over at Finn, who was speaking to Clarke. “I can't believe _he's_ here. I thought it would be harder. To find them, I mean. But they found us.”

I smiled sadly. “He'll always find you,” I said. “That's love.”

Raven's expression turned sympathetic. “Bellamy will find you too,” she assured me.

Before I could say anything else, Finn was back with a clean rag. He handed to Raven and she thanked him, pressing it to her head. “This is Clarke. She was on the Dropship too,” Finn told her.

In all the excitement and euphoria of being on the ground, I hadn't even thought to introduce the two of them. We had a lot to talk about with Clarke.

“Clarke?” Raven repeated, standing up. “This was all because of your mom,” she told her.

“My mom?” Clarke said hesitantly.

I nodded my head. “This was all her plan,” I explained. “We were trying to come down here together, but if we waited...” I trailed off and met Raven's eyes. “Oh my god.”

“We couldn't wait because the Council was voting whether to kill three-hundred people to save air,” Raven revealed.

“When?” Clarke asked urgently.

“Today.” I answered, backing away from them. I turned on my heel and ran back to the pod. “We have to tell them you're alive!” I called back. I ducked into the pod and reached for the radio, but where it should have been were broken wires. I looked on the floor of the pod and all around. It wasn't there. “The radio's gone,” I announced. “It must've gotten loose during reentry. I shoulda strapped it to the A-strut.” I shook my head and punched the side of the pod. “Stupid!” I exclaimed, rubbing my cheeks with one hand.

“No, no, this is my fault,” Clarke said, touching my shoulder comfortingly. “Someone got here before us,” she glanced at Finn and I saw a flash of something in her eyes. “We have to find him,” she said.

Clarke started walking speedily towards the edge of the clearing, disappearing into the trees. Finn took Raven's hand and they followed. I reached behind the seats in the pod and grabbed my back, slipping my arms through the straps, and ran to catch up with the three of them. I wanted to ask Clarke why someone would take our radio, but I felt that it wasn't the time. There was something else going on with her; something other than the radio.

I caught up with the others and felt the tension immediately. Raven seemed oblivious to it. She walked by Finn and I walked by Clarke. We retraced Clarke and Finn's steps, keeping our eyes peeled for any signs of the radio thief.

“It's still early,” Clarke said to me. Her tone was smooth but it sounded forced. “He'll be the only one of our people out here.”

I glanced at her. “ _Our_ people?” I questioned her choice of words. “What do you mean _our_ people?” I asked.

Clarke's muscles tensed and she didn't reply. I decided not to press the matter. We would talk later about it. About everything. I was sure that a lot had happened with the delinquents on the ground, just like a lot had happened on the Ark since they left.

We didn't talk after that. The trees were so densely packed that I wasn't sure how we were possibly going to spot the thief. I could barely see ten meters around us. After twenty minutes, I stopped walking. Clarke did too when she realised that I had and we gathered in a circle with Finn and Raven.

“We should spread out,” I said. “Cover more ground.”

Clarke and Finn looked at each other. “But you two don't know the terrain,” Finn pointed out.

I shrugged. “We'll stay within shouting distance,” I said. “But we're never gonna find him like this.”

They reluctantly agreed and we spread out. I went to the left, my eyes constantly sweeping the trees as I walked. I lost sight of Clarke, who was closest to me, after a few minutes. I called her name and she replied, so I knew she was still close enough. I was finding it hard to concentrate with everything that was around me. It was better than I ever imagined. I ran my hand over the bark of one of the trees and smiled.

A movement caught my eye and I whipped around, seeing a figure moving through the trees up ahead. “Hey!” I shouted, breaking into a run. They didn't turn around. Instead, they sped up a little. “Hey!” I called again, running faster. I caught up the man and grabbed his shoulder, spinning him around to face me. My mouth was already open to start yelling at him, determined to find out where the radio was, but no words came out when I saw his face. Our eyes widened and a simultaneous gasp slipped out of both our mouths.

 


	16. The Mask That Fell

I WASN'T SURE THAT I could trust my eyes anymore. Everything I had seen since I opened them in the pod... none of it could be real, right? Him standing in front of me in a forest—that just couldn't be real. It was a dream. I had to be dreaming. There was no other explanation.

His skin was darker, darker than Clarke's. He had naturally olive skin, but now it was a light brown. His face was covered with freckles, more obvious than they were on the Ark. His dark, curly hair was a damp, dangled mess from the rain, which had stopped now, and there was a small cut on his left cheek. Insignificant as it was, I noticed it.

I reached out to touch him, but hesitated when my hand was less than an inch from his face. I took a deep breath and touched his face, covering the cut with my hand.

_He's real._

I threw my arms around him, my body crashing against his so suddenly that he stumbled back a few steps, a soft ' _oof_ ' escaping his lips. He wrapped ~~his~~ one arm ~~s~~ around my waist and put the other hand on the back of my neck like always, and held onto me. We hugged each other so tightly it was a wonder that either of us could breathe. I didn't want to let go. I didn't _ever_ want to let go.

I had never felt so happy. Tears of pure joy poured down my cheeks and I laughed into the crook of his neck. We swayed from side to side. “You're the biggest fucking idiot I've ever known, you know that?” I said through my laughter. My voice was thick with emotion.

Bellamy moved back just a little so that he could look at me. “Ren... How are you here?” he asked, hopelessly confused.

I grinned. “I used my head, Bell. You should try it someday.”

Bellamy shook his head and laughed. His eyes moved down to the locket that hung around my neck. He touched it gently. “Your mom's necklace,” he said softly.

I nodded my head. He hugged me again. It was shorter this time, and I was the one who pulled away. I cupped both his cheeks with my hands and looked into his dark eyes. They were almost black; it was hard to tell where his pupils ended and his irises began. “I never got to say it back,” I whispered. “Bell, I love you too,” I told him.

Bellamy frowned and his lips parted in shock. “Wha— But... But what about Roman?” he asked.

I couldn't help but smile. All this time, we had been in the same boat. We loved each other but each thought that the other didn't feel the same way. “We broke up,” I explained. My eyes dropped to his lips and I couldn't resist. I kissed him hard. My entire body tingled and I felt like I was floating.

“Hey! _Bellamy_!” Clarke's angry voice exploded behind us. I spun around, startled. She stared at us in shock. “You two _know_ each other?” she frowned. She shook her head, seeming to remember something else. “Where is it?” she barked at Bellamy, making my frown in confusion.

When I looked at Bellamy, I hardly recognised him. He wore a cool, cocky expression. “Hey, Princess,” he said smoothly. “You taking a walk in the woods?”

“They're getting ready to kill three-hundred people up there, to save oxygen. And I can guarantee you it won't be Council members. It'll be working people— _you're_ people.” She shouted at him, jabbing her finger into his chest.

I stared at him in utter shock. “It was you,” I realised. “ _You_ took the radio from Raven and I's pod?”

Finn came flying through the trees and shoved him. “Bellamy. Where's the radio?” he growled.

Bellamy shoved him back. “I have no idea _what_ you're talking about.” He snarled.

“Bellamy Blake?” Raven looked him up and down. “They're looking everywhere for you,” she told him.

“Shut up.” Bellamy snapped at her.

I stood back, still processing this new information. Bellamy took the radio. Why the hell would Bellamy take our _radio_?

“Looking for him why?” Clarke insisted.

“He shot Chancellor Jaha.” Raven revealed.

Clarke and Finn looked at him in disgust. “That's why you took the wristbands,” the former realised. “Needed everyone to think we're _dead_.”

I felt like I had been punched in the gut. I couldn't speak. I couldn't move. I could only stare at Bellamy. I didn't even know what to _think_.

“And all that 'whatever the hell we want'. You just care about saving your own skin.” Finn accused.

Bellamy turned away from them and tried to leave, but Raven ran after him and got in his way. “Hey! Shooter. Where's the radio?” she asked.

“Get out of my way!” Bellamy said angrily.

“Where is it?!” Raven insisted.

“I should've killed you when I had the chance.” Bellamy spat.

“Really?” Raven challenged. “Well, I'm right here.”

In a flash, Bellamy grabbed her and pinned her against a tree, his hand around her throat. That was when I moved. I didn't think, I didn't speak. I just moved. I lunged at him and my balled fist struck his jaw hard enough to knock him away from Raven and onto the uneven ground, landing with a soft thud. “All this time,” I hissed. “All this time you've been trying to stop our people from coming down—you've been stopping _me_ from coming down. While I was risking my _ass_ for you?” I spat at him.

Clarke stepped between us. “Okay. Stop it.” she said firmly.

Bellamy got to his feet. “Jaha deserved to die. You all know that.” he said.

“Yeah, he's not my favourite person either,” I snapped. “But he's not dead.”

Bellamy looked at me. I held his gaze. “What?” he breathed.

“You're a lousy shot,” I looked him up and down. “Always were.”

“Bellamy,” Clarke walked up to him and grabbed his arm. “Don't you see what this means? You're _not_ a murderer. You always did what you had to do to protect your sister. _That's_ who you are. And you can do it again, by protecting _three hundred_ of your people,” she said. “Where's the radio?” she begged.

Bellamy shook his head. I wished that I didn't know him—that he was just a stranger. Then I wouldn't recognise the guilt that was crushing him. The regret. The _pain_. I had seen it before, after the Unity Day masquerade dance. He always blamed himself for his mother's death. He never said it, but I could see it in his eyes.

I wanted to stop caring about him and hate him for what he had done. He left me—the girl he claimed he loved—and my mother—who had always been there for him, even when he had his own mother too—to die in space. He abandoned us. He stole my radio. He took the delinquents wristbands. He was the reason so many tiles were dark. Not all those kids were dead.

But I couldn't. I felt that familiar pull on my heart; that desire to hug him and tell him it was all going to be okay. I wanted to kiss him again. But I couldn't. I was so angry.

“It's too late,” was all Bellamy said to us.

 


	17. Flares

I DIDN'T THINK THAT I would spend my first couple of hours on earth searching the woods for a radio thief, and then sitting on a riverbank, watching twenty or so juvenile delinquents from the Ark search the riverbed for said stolen radio. It had been roughly two hours since Raven and I landed, according to Clarke's watch. The watch had belonged to her father. I remembered him wearing it.

I held a damp rag to my forehead as I sat on the riverbank. Since the moment I stepped out of the pod, I hadn't really looked around me at the beauty of earth. I was too angry to admire it. After Bellamy agreed to show us where he threw away the radio, Finn went back to camp to get more people to help look. Not all of them came. Clarke said that the others were building a wall around their camp.

“Why?” I had asked her.

She looked at me, regret and fear painted all over her face. “There's a lot you still don't know about the ground,” she told me. “Everything we thought we knew, everything they told us... it's wrong.”

“What do you mean?” I frowned. She was standing at the bottom of the riverbank, ankle deep in the water.

Clarke took a deep breath. “There are others,” she blurted out. She didn't seem to believe the words herself. “We call them Grounders. Their ancestors survived the nuclear bombs. All the time our people were surviving in space, there were others surviving here—on the ground.”

I was shocked into silence by this revelation. I forgot about how betrayed I felt and how angry I was at Bellamy for a few minutes after she told me. She left me to it after that, to let me process it. There were survivors on the ground. _Humans_. We weren't alone. I expected to come down to a planet inhabited only by one hundred teenage criminals—and Bellamy—but I got more than I bargained for.

There was one good thing about it. It meant that the ground really was survivable. No one was going to die from the radiation because it was gone and it was safe for the rest of our people. Just as soon as we found the radio and _told_ them that. With that thought, my anger came back and I had to clench my jaw. I felt cheated. I never thought that he was capable of doing something like this. He was going to let two thousand people die slow and painful deaths on the Ark. I was more angry about that than the fact that I was one of them. He was more selfish than I ever realised.

A shadow passed over me and I didn't look up. I already knew it was him and I knew that if I looked at him, I would hit him again. My hand was still sore from the first time.

“Renee.” His deep voice made my stomach flip and my head spin. I hated how easily he could affect me. “I can explain. I can explain all of this if you'll just listen to me,” he said, sitting down on the grass beside me. “I didn't know it was you in the pod when I took the radio. I couldn't see your face. If I'd known, I would've—”

“You would've what?” I snapped, turning my head and glaring at him. “You would've left the radio? Helped me?” I laughed humourlessly. “That's bull _shit_ , Blake, and you know it. You opened that pod and you saw that there were two people in it. You didn't know whether they were dead or alive and you didn't care. You left us for dead. It shouldn't have mattered who it was or who it might have been.” I shook my head in disgust and looked away from him.

“Renee, I—”

“I don't wanna hear it!” I snarled. “All that time I was working my ass off, risking my life, to get to you and simultaneously save _three-hundred_ innocent lives, you were trying to stop the rest of the Ark from coming down.” I stood up. “You said you love me, but clearly you don't. You don't give a shit about me, or anyone else but yourself. You were going to let me _die_ up there.” I shook my head. “I can't even stand to look at you, let alone _talk_ to you.”

I threw the damp rag into his lap and strode away from him, into the river to help look for the radio. I was grateful now for the throbbing pain in my skull. It distracted it me and prevented me from thinking about anything other than the pain.

I hoped my mum was okay. Kane would probably question her and she would have to pretend for the second time in her life that she was unaware of the crimes of someone she cared deeply about. She lied to the Council after they found Octavia, just like I did. If they knew that we knew about an illegal child for sixteen years, we would have been given the same treatment as Bellamy. We would have lost our jobs and have no choice but to do some low-paid Sanitation job.

I hadn't seen Octavia yet. She didn't come to the river with the others, so assumed she didn't know I was there. I knew she would be happy to see me, and I would be over the moon to see her. Especially after what I had just found out about Bellamy. I was proud of her for defying him and not taking off her wristband.

“Hey!” a boy called. He was about a hundred meters down-stream from me. “I found it!”

I ran to him and snatched it from his hands, muttering a quick thank you as I inspected the damage.

“Can you fix it?” Clarke asked me.

I sighed deeply as I passed it to Raven to have a look at. “I don't know. Maybe,” I replied. “But it'll take half a day just to dry out the components and see what's broken,” I explained, overlapping my hands on the top of my head and readjusting my hat. “We don't have enough _time_.”

“Like I said,” Bellamy spoke behind me. “It's too late.”

I spun around and lunged at him, but Raven and Finn caught me and held me back. “This is _your_ fault, you selfish bastard!” I screamed at him.

Clarke marched up to him. “Do you have any idea what you did?” she asked. “Do you even _care_?!”

“You asked me to help. I helped.” Bellamy growled stubbornly.

I shrugged Raven and Finn off me and glared at him. “Three hundred people are gonna die because of you.” I said to him, more calmly than before. “You didn't kill the Chancellor, but you've killed them. Their blood is on _your_ hands, Blake.”

“Hold up,” Raven said, looking at the radio in her hands. “We don't have to talk to the Ark. We just have to let them know we're down here, right?”

“Yeah, but how do we do that with no radio?” Finn asked, throwing a pointed look at Bellamy.

Raven smirked proudly. I knew the look well. It meant that she had a plan that she knew could really work. “We build flares,” she said.

The others looked bewildered, wondering how we could possibly pull it off, but I caught onto what she was thinking immediately. We had a similar way of thinking. “Holy shit, Reyes, that might actually work,” I said, nodding my head slowly as I formulated a plan myself. “We could use the rockets from our pod. They'll still have a little fuel in them. It'll definitely be enough to launch a couple flares.”

“They'll need to be bright,” Raven added. “If we want the Ark to see them. And we'll need to time it just right. If the Ark is in the wrong place, they won't see them.”

“I can do that,” I said. “I can figure it out. We'll have a window of, maybe, five or ten minutes. But we can do it. We can pull this off.”

“Great,” Finn said, looking between us. “Just tell us what we need to do.”

Raven and I shared a look. She nodded, telling me to go ahead and take the lead. “Right, Raven, you take a couple people back to the pod and get the rockets. The rest of us will go back to the Dropship. I'll figure out our time window. We'll tie in the batteries to help launch the flares. The more energy we put into the launch, the higher they'll go the more likely the Ark will see them.” I glanced around at the teenagers around us. “You five,” I pointed at a group of boys that were standing together. “Go with Finn and Raven. Clarke, you're with me.”

After Raven handed me back the radio and I slipped it into my bag, we split up. Bellamy walked at the back of the group on the way back to camp. I was glad. It was the first chance I'd had to look around me properly and admire the world. It was better than I ever imaged. All the colour and the smells and the way the light didn't flicker or dim. It was constant and bright and... warm. The air was so fresh. It felt cold in my lungs.

“Hey, are you all right?” the boy walking next to me said. He looked at me, concerned. “You're limping,” he pointed out.

“I'm fine,” I said quickly. “I, uh, broke my knee a couple years back,” I explained.

“Oh, right, sorry,” he said sheepishly. “It's amazing, right?” he said to change the subject, motioning the trees that surrounded us on all sides. He smiled at me. “It doesn't get any less beautiful with time.”

I grinned. “Good,” I said.

“I'm Miller,” he introduced himself. He held out his hand.

I was about to shake it when I noticed his bare wrist and instantly retracted my hand. “You took it off,” I stated, raising my eyebrow.

He looked down at his wrist and realised what I was talking about. “I didn't,” he defended. “Yesterday, Monty was trying to use the wristbands to contact the Ark but, well, he fried them all. Everyone's came off.”

My face fell. “So they're all broken?” I asked.

Miller nodded. “The whole lot,” he confirmed.

I covered my mouth and looked ahead of me. “We need to be fast. The Council will think you're all dead—that the radiation wiped you out.” I quickened my pace and so did Miller. “I'm Renee, by the way,” I told him.

“I know who you are,” he admitted. “I was on the guard, before they locked me up, and my dad's a Sergeant. We know Roman.”

“Oh,” was all I said.

“Does he know you're here?” Miller asked.

I shrugged. “I guess he probably does by now,” I mused. “We kind of... broke up right before I left,” I told him. “You mentioned Monty a minute ago?” I said before he could reply. I didn't want to talk about Roman. “That isn't Monty Green, is it? From Farm Station?” I asked.

Miller nodded. “Yeah, that's him,” he said.

I laughed softly. “I knew that kid was smart, but I didn't realise just how smart.”

“Did you work with him?” Miller asked me.

I nodded my head. “Yeah, I worked with him. I _trained_ him, too,” I explained. “He shadowed me for a couple months,” I added. “We got to know each other pretty well. He would've made a brilliant engineer if he hadn't gotten himself arrested.”

I was glad to hear that Monty was okay. We only knew each other for a short time, but he seemed like a good kid. He was funny, too.

We arrived back at the delinquent's camp. When we walked in through the gap in the half-built wall, I could feel the stares. I stuck out like a sore thumb. I was too old to be there. These were kids. Maybe a couple of them had turned eighteen since landing on the ground, but they were still _kids_. Most of them, even some of the guys, were smaller than me.

They looked at me the same way they looked at Bellamy, I realised as I said goodbye to Miller and followed Clarke towards the Dropship. They looked at me like an authority figure. There was an element of suspicion, too. I heard them whispering to one another. ' _I think she's a guard_ ,' one of them said. I let them think whatever they wanted as long as they let me get on with my work. There was only one thing I cared about now and that was making sure that the Ark knew that we were all alive.

Clarke led me into the Dropship and I let my bag slide off my shoulder. The first level was empty of people. There were hammocks made out of the parachute material and I could tell that people had been sleeping in there. The nights were probably pretty cold. It was getting late in the year.

Clarke rustled around in something at the back of the Dropship. She produced a notepad and a couple of pencils from a large box. “Here,” she said, handing them to me.

I raised an eyebrow. “Where'd you get these?” I asked, knowing that she couldn't have taken them with her from the Ark.

She tensed and her lips curled downwards. “Finn gave them to me,” she said weakly. “He found a whole bunch of supplies in a bunker not far from here,” she went on. She shrugged. “He knows I like to draw.”

I glanced at her. She was trying to hide that she was upset, but she was failing. She looked miserable. “So you and him...” I trailed off.

Clarke's eyes widened. “How did you—”

I rolled my eyes and chuckled. “Come on, Clarke, I've known you for years,” I reminded her. “I can tell.”

Clarke sighed and her shoulders slumped. “I didn't know about Raven, I swear. He didn't tell me,” she said. “He was just— He was so nice to me. He was sweet.”

I smiled knowingly. “It'll be okay,” I told her. “You'll get over him. He's not worth it, anyway. I just hope Raven sees that too.”

“You're not going to tell her, are you?” Clarke asked.

I shook my head. “No. It's not my business,” I said. “She'll find out. Liars like him always get caught, and Raven's smart. She'll figure it out. I give it a week.” There was a pause. I cleared my throat and held up the notebook. “Thanks for this,” I said. “I better get to work.”

Clarke nodded. “Yeah, I'll leave you to it,” she said. “I'll bring you some food and water. You must be hungry.”

I nodded my head. “I am,” I admitted. Clarke turned to leave but I called her back. “Can I have your watch?” I asked. “I'll give it back once I'm done,” I promised.

Clarke nodded. “Of course,” she said, undoing it and handing it to me.

She left the Dropship and I sat down on the floor with my back against the wall. If I hadn't been holding the watch, I would have lost all track of time. It flew by as I wrote down numbers and calculations. I had been sitting in the Dropship for almost an hour and had filled two sheets with my calculations when the parachute that had been hung over the entrance was pushed aside and a familiar Asian boy walked in.

I threw down my pencil and jumped to my feet, grinning. “Monty!” I exclaimed, hugging him.

“Renee? What the hell are you doing here?” He asked, hugging me back.

“It's a long story,” I told him. “It's good to see you,” I said. “What the hell were you thinking—getting yourself arrested?” I shook my head in mock disappointment.

Monty shrugged. “Blame Jasper,” he said. I had never met Jasper, but Monty spoke about him often during the weeks he shadowed me at work. “What are you doing?” he asked, nodding at the notebook on the floor and the numbers that covered its pages.

I picked it up and handed it to him. “We're going to launch flares,” I explained. “We need to tell the Ark that we're down here and the radio is trashed, so... this is plan B. I'm calculating our time window,” I paused. “If they don't see the flares, three-hundred innocent people will die.”

Monty seemed unfased. He had obviously already heard the news. “You need any help?” He asked.

I shook my head. “Nah, I'm good,” I said and thanked him. I took the notebook back from him and leant against the wall behind me. “Do you know Octavia Blake? Or at least where she is?” I asked him.

“I know her,” he nodded, “but I haven't seen her since early this morning when we saw the pod coming down. You should ask her brother, Bellamy.”

I clenched my jaw. “Yeah, I'm avoiding that bastard at all costs,” I said bitterly. “He's the one who jacked the radio. If it wasn't for him, we'd already be speaking to the Ark,” I spat.

Just then, the parachute curtain rustled again and the aforementioned Bellamy Blake walked in, as if on cue. He looked at me and then at Monty. The latter bowed his head and climbed the ladder to the second level, sensing the tension that Bellamy brought with him into the Dropship.

“I, uh, wanted to see what I can do to help,” Bellamy said to me. His eyes were everywhere but on mine. He felt guilty.

_Good._

“Yeah. You can stay out of the way and not screw anything else up.” I said, turning away from him and sitting down on the floor again.

“Please, Renee, I want to help,” he pleaded. “I'm trying to make up for what I've done.”

I scoffed. “That's gonna take a lot more than just helping us out with this. Just piss off, Bellamy.” I said without turning around.

I heard him sigh and he shuffled back to the exit. He paused, and then he spoke. “When I came to see you that morning... I was going to ask you to come with me,” he said. “Then I realised Roman was there and I... I knew I couldn't. I didn't know how bad things were then.” The parachute rustled and he was gone.

A moment later, Monty came back down the ladder. “So, you two know each other then?” he said.

I nodded. “Yeah. We've been best friends since before we could walk,” I answered.

Monty raised an eyebrow. “You don't sound like friends.”

I picked my pencil up and continued working. “He left me for dead. Twice.”

Monty sat with me in the Dropship. He talked to me, knowing that I preferred not to work in total silence. The ground was deafeningly quiet. It was strange not hearing that constant hum of machinery.

He told me everything that had happened from the moment they were taken from their cells to the moment they saw Raven and I's pod shoot across the sky. He told me about the two boys who died before they landed. They followed Finn out of their seats and were killed when the parachutes deployed.

Clarke left the Dropship with a small group less than an hour after they landed. Monty and Jasper were with them, Octavia and Finn too. Wells Jaha wanted to go with them, but he couldn't. His ankle was injured during a fight with a boy named John Murphy. They were headed to Mount Weather—where they were supposed to land—to bring back supplies. They only got as far as the river when Jasper took a spear to the chest. That was when they discovered that they weren't alone; that there were others on the ground.

Clarke went back out to find Jasper the same day with Finn, Bellamy, Murphy and Wells. It sounded like the first few days were utter chaos. They found Jasper and brought him back, but he was badly hurt. It took them several days to figure a way to save him, and he hadn't been the same since. He was terrified of leaving the camp.

I was surprised when Monty told me that Wells died just five days ago. Bellamy and Murphy attacked him during the first night on the ground and forcefully took his wristband. It made sense. Wells would never willingly take it off. I was sad to hear that he was really dead. Not because I knew him, but because I knew he didn't deserve it.

When they found his body, they assumed it was the grounders. But a few days later, Jasper and Octavia found a knife, along with two of his severed fingers. The knife was made from metal from the Dropship and had JM carved into it—John Murphy. The delinquents formed a lynch mob and hung Murphy from a tree outside the camp. That was when Charlotte, a thirteen-year-old girl, confessed to Wells's murder.

The same night that Raven and I were finishing our work on the pod and preparing to leave the Ark, the delinquents were running around the woods. One group, led by John Murphy, was hunting Charlotte. The other, consisting only of Clarke, Finn and Bellamy, were trying to protect her. Charlotte threw herself off a cliff to save Clarke, and they banished Murphy. Monty told me that he wasn't even present for most of what had gone on in the past two weeks. He had been sitting in the Dropship for most of it, trying to use the wristbands to contact the Ark. I told him that Abby had the same idea.

I was glad that he had told me everything. I felt like I was less in the dark about things now. Half the names he mentioned I had never heard before and I had no idea who they were, but that didn't make a difference. I was up to date with what life had been like on the ground so far. None of them had actually _seen_ a Grounder. Jasper was taken by them and strung up as live bait, but he was unconscious for most of it.

I wondered what the Grounders were like. By the sounds of things, they were savages. They used primitive weapons nothing like what we had up on the Ark. I thought about the gun burning a hole in my bag. It was possible that it was the only gun on the ground. No, that couldn't be true. There would be some somewhere, left from before the bombs.

I was sure of it.

 

 

It was dark out. The stars were so beautiful from the ground, but I didn't have time to stand and stare. Everyone was hurrying around the camp, which was illuminated by firelight. Finn and another delinquent carried the control panel into the camp, following my instructions on where to put it.

The rockets were placed onto the launch slides we had fashioned from a tripod of tree branches and metal from the Dropship. I positioned myself behind the control panel. It was made from the controls in Raven and I's pod. There were cables running from it to the flares, a hundred and fifty meters away in the trees. I lifted the red covers on the first row of switches and flicked them all up. We were rapidly approaching our launch window. We had to be accurate within less than a minute. Any later or earlier and the Ark wouldn't be able to see the flares, whether they were watching or not.

People were shouting to each other. The air was full of nervous excitement. Even though most of them were sixteen or seventeen, they were still too young and naïve to truly grasp the severity of the situation. I wasn't sure that all of them really knew what was going on. I wished I could be that young and naïve again.

I watched as the three rockets were placed on the launch slides. We only had enough rocket fuel left for three. I hoped they were enough. The success of our plan depending on so many factors, most of which were out of our control. I made eye contact with Miller across the camp. He was standing with a couple other guys, eating berries from a small metal bowl. He waved and I returned the gesture.

Raven came over and stood beside me. “We're ready when you are,” she said.

I flicked the next row of switches and finally moved to the launch button. I hesitated. _Please, God,_ I thought, even though I didn't believe in any god, _let someone see._ I hit the button. The flares lit up and shot up from the ground. They were dim at first, but when they were several hundred meters up, the rocket fuel kicked in and they exploded in pink light that illuminated the whole clearing and the faces of everyone in it. All around me, awed gasps filled the air.

I should have felt the same. I should have felt some relief that the flares launched. I should have felt happy because I was on the _ground_. I felt none of that. Instead, there was a knot in my chest and it was only growing tighter. There was nothing to distract me now. My hands were still and I had nothing to work on. All the emotions hit me all at once and it was like the air was pushed out of my lungs, leaving me breathless.

I spotted Bellamy in the crowd. He was near the front, talking to Clarke. She said something to him and he looked over his shoulder. Our eyes met for a split second before I turned away. It hurt too much to look at him. I wove my way through the crowd of delinquents and walked up the ramp into the Dropship. I grabbed my bag from the floor and opened it, taking out the radio. The gun was still in there, but I had wrapped it in a t-shirt.

I started taking the radio apart. I had to do something with my hands. I stripped it, taking away the plastic casing and separating out all the components and circuit boards that were inside. I passed all the parts through my hands once I was done, desperate to be doing _something_. Soon, my vision blurred. Tears cascaded down my cheeks and I was powerless to stop them. I slumped against the wall and sunk to the floor, finally letting it all out and crying into my arm.

 


	18. His Sister's Keeper

THANKFULLY, BY THE TIME the excitement over the flares died down and the delinquents started coming back into the centre of the camp, I was all cried out. My eyes were still a little puffy and red, but no one could tell in the dim light in the Dropship. Not many people came in there, anyway.

Clarke came in an hour later and found me sitting with the radio. I had set up a small make-shift desk to work at. I had sorted all the parts of the radio into three sections—one for the parts that were still in working order, one for that parts that needed to dry out before I could properly assess the damage, and one for the parts that were trashed beyond repair. Unfortunately, the transmitter had landed in the final pile. It was smashed. And I couldn't fix it.

“You should come outside,” Clarke said, alerting me to her presence in the Dropship. There were a few kids on the second level. I didn't know what they were doing but they were making a lot of noise, laughing and shouting. “The hunting group just got back. They caught some wild boar.”

I looked over my shoulder at Clarke. “Is wild bore any good?” I asked.

She shrugged and smiled humorously. “Panther is worse,” she said.

My eyes widened. “ _Panther_?” I repeated.

Clarke nodded. “Wells shot one on our second day here,” she told me. As soon as she mentioned his name, her eyes went sad and she looked at the ground. “Of course, Bellamy took the credit.”

I rolled my eyes. “Of course he did,” I grumbled. I gave Clarke a wary look. I was never very good with other people's emotions. I never knew whether saying something would make it better or worse. “I'm really sorry about Wells,” I blurted out. “Monty told me what happened.”

Clarke tried to smile but it turned into a strange, twisted grimace. “I hated him,” she whispered sadly. “I thought he got my father killed. He was the only other person who knew but... I was wrong,” she explained. A tear rolled down her cheek.

I stood up and pulled her into me, wrapping my arms tightly around her. Clarke was like a little sister to me.

“I'd only just found out that wasn't him,” she sobbed. “He'd only just forgiven me for hating him.”

“Clarke, it's okay,” I said to her, even though I knew the words were useless.

“It's not okay,” she shook her head. “It was her, Renee. She was the one who turned my dad in. She's the reason he's dead,” she said.

I frowned and pulled away, looking at her face. “Who?”

Clarke looked up at me, sad and angry at the same time. She wasn't angry with me though. “My mom,” she said. “It was my mom who told Jaha. My dad was going to go public with his discovery. He was going to tell everyone that the Ark was dying even though the Council told him not to. They thought it would cause a panic. He was going to do it anyway and I was going to help him. She turned us both in,” she told me.

I was shocked. I couldn't believe that Abby would do something like that. I didn't _want_ to believe it. “Clarke... I had no idea.”

“Wells let me hate him so that I didn't hate my mom,” Clarke said quietly.

I put my arm around her and started leading her towards the Dropship door. “Let's get something to eat,” I said as she wiped her tears away. “I don't know about you but I'm starving. And I'm dying to taste something other than the muck they serve up on the Ark,” I added jokingly. It made her laugh, which was good.

We ate at the fire with a group of delinquents. Miller was there. We talked. He told me why he was arrested—he stole a bunch of stuff and sold it on the black market. He told me about his life on the Ark—about his boyfriend, Bryan. Clarke was quiet at first, but she soon joined in the conversations at the fire. It was nice. I hadn't expected to enjoy being around these people. After all, they were all criminals and they were all younger than me. It seemed, however, that their short time on the ground had forced a lot of them to do a lot of growing up. I felt like I was talking to people my own age who I had known for years.

The later it got, the colder it got and closer we all huddled into the fire. People started retreating to the tents while others stayed up for the night watch. Clarke and I went to a tent that was near the Dropship and settled in. There were no blankets. There were nine other people in the tent, lying on a tarpaulin sheet.

Within ten minutes, Clarke was fast asleep and I was the only one left awake in the tent. The camp outside was quiet. The glow of the fire was dimmer and it was cold. I had a horrible feeling in my gut. I still hadn't seen Octavia. I was really worried about her. She was half the reason I couldn't sleep. The other half consisted of the three-hundred people that might be dying up on the Ark, and Bellamy.

Bellamy Blake. I never thought I could hate him, but a part of me really did. I hated him for stealing the radio and ruining the one chance we had to contact the Ark. I hated him for encouraging the delinquents to take off their wristbands. I hated him for leaving me and my mother for dead. I hated him for shooting the Chancellor. I hated him for _not taking me with him_.

I sat up after a couple of hours, tired of lying there, staring at the roof of the tent. I hugged my knees to my chest, trying to trap some heat in my body. I was just about to get up and go back to the Dropship to work on the radio when the tent flaps were pulled aside and firelight flooded into the tent. Bellamy's face appeared next to the flaming torch. He looked at the sleeping faces and froze when he saw me; sitting up, wide awake and staring back at him.

“You're up,” he said dumbly.

I got up and clambered over the sleeping bodies and past him out of the tent. “Yeah. Knowing that hundreds of people might be dying up on the Ark makes it pretty hard to sleep.” I said pointedly. I deliberately kept my voice cold, knowing that it would hurt him.

“You and Raven's flares will work,” Bellamy replied.

“Our radio would've worked better.” I snapped. “I risked my life getting my hands on it.” I stopped walking and so did he. We turned to face each other. I saw his jaw go tense and he wouldn't look me in the eye. He was holding back from saying something. Part of me wanted to know what it was, but the other wanted him to shut up and think about what he had done. I _wanted_ him to feel guilty about it. I never thought I would feel that way.

As I looked at him, I couldn't help but notice how handsome he looked in the flickering, moving light of the torch. I felt the familiar stir in the pit of my stomach and fluttering of my heart. God, I was so in love with this man. I gritted my teeth and ignored my feelings. For the first time, I tried to push them away and let hatred and anger replace them.

“Have you seen Octavia?” Bellamy asked.

I shook my head. “I've been wondering where she is,” I admitted. “She's probably fine,” I said, more for myself than for him. “Probably off chasing butterflies or something. It's Octavia.”

“Renee, I've checked the camp. Twice. She's not here.”

The panic in his eyes made me panic. “Okay,” I said calmly. “I'll help you find her. Let's check again. You go to the Dropship, I'll check the rest of the tents.”

We started walking and he glanced down at me. “Thank you,” he said.

I glared at him. “Don't thank me. I'm not doing this for you,” I veered away from him and headed to the row of tents on the other side of the Dropship. “I'm doing this for Octavia,” I muttered, even though he was out of earshot.

 

 

“ _Mom, please, let me get a doctor!” Bellamy begged as his mother released another groan of pain and doubled over._

“ _Breathe,” Adaline told her friend as she held her hand. She looked back at me. “Renee, go and get more towels,” she instructed._

_I ran through to the next room and took as many towels down from the shelf as I could carry._

“ _You can't tell anyone. Tell me what happens if you do. Say it.” Aurora was saying when I came back into the room and handed my mother the towels._

_Bellamy reached for my hand and squeezed it tightly. “Y-you get floated,” he said. We stood close to each other and I could feel him shaking. “I don't understand,” he said. “Why is it wrong to have more than one baby?”_

“ _The Ark couldn't survive. The Chancellor can't allow it,” his mother explained._

“ _He's like the emperor Augustus, right?” Bellamy squeaked. I had never seen him so afraid and it made me afraid._

“ _That's right. Just like the emperor we read about,” Aurora agreed. She smiled at her son, but it fell away quickly with another agonised gasp. She grabbed Adaline's arm. “The baby's coming!” she breathed._

_Adaline positioned herself between Bellamy's mother's legs and ordered him to grab the blanket. I moved beside Aurora and took her hand. She squeezed it instantly. It hurt, but I tried not to let it show. I knew that she was in more pain than I was. My mother told me once that childbirth was the most painful thing she had ever experienced, but I was worth every moment of the pain. Aurora's baby would be worth it too._

“ _Here we go,” Adaline said softly as Aurora's pained cries turned to softer pants and her grip on my hand loosened. “It's a girl,” my mother said, wrapping the tiny baby in a blanket and handing her to Aurora._

_Aurora smiled as tears slid down her sweaty face. “You have a sister,” she said to Bellamy. She carefully transferred the infant into her brother's arms._

“ _What are you going to call her?” I asked._

“ _You should name her,” Aurora said to Bellamy._

_He glanced at his mother and then back down at his baby sister. “Augustus had a sister. Octavia,” he said._

_My mother took Aurora's arms and helped her to her feet. “Let's get you cleaned up,” she said, leading her friend towards the small bathroom._

_Aurora looked back at Bellamy. “Your sister, your responsibility,” she said to him weakly._

_Bellamy's eyes widened. “Mom. Mom, no, don't leave us,” he said._

“ _Look after her,” Adaline told Bellamy and I before she shut the door. “Don't let her cry,” she added._

“ _No,” Bellamy whispered, choking on the word._

_I sat beside and hugged him as he held his baby sister. “It's going to be okay, Bell,” I said, even though I had no idea. I was only six, after all._

_Baby Octavia started to fuss and small cries came out of her mouth. Bellamy bounced her carefully in his arms, like all the books said to do. He shushed her softly. “Please, don't cry,” he begged. He offered her his finger, hoping that it would silence her. It worked. She eagerly sucked on his fingertip and her crying stopped. “See, I told you. It's okay,” he said, relief washing over him. “I won't let anything bad happen to you, Octavia. I promise.”_

 

 

Outside the Dropship, the delinquents were arming themselves. The makeshift weapons that Bellamy had gathered paled in comparison to the object that I held in my hands. I loaded it and put one of the spare mags into my jacket pocket. Roman taught me how to use a gun years ago. I had decent aim. No amazing—just decent.

“My sister's been out there alone for twelve hours,” Bellamy's deep voice boomed. His guilt had been replaced with worry. All he cared about now was finding Octavia. “We're not coming back without her,” he told the delinquents.

I slid the gun into the waistband of my jeans, feeling its cold metal press into my hip. I had never liked guns, but I was suddenly extremely glad that I had brought it. When I took it, I was thinking about the one hundred criminals that I was going to be joining on the ground. Now, I was thinking about the Grounders that wanted to kill them.

I walked out of the Dropship and into the cold night air. Everyone was awake now. They were gathered around Bellamy, picking up the weapons at his feet. He left the pile when he saw me, making his way over to where I stood at the bottom of the ramp.

“Here,” I said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a small knife. He put it in my hand and I looked at it for a moment. “You'll need something to defend yourself.”

I tossed it back to him. “I don't need it,” I said. Before he could protest, I lifted the hem of my top and showed him the gun. “Let's hope I'm a better shot than you.” At first, he flinched at my comment, but I hadn't meant it to hurt him. I managed a small smile to let him know that I was joking and he returned it, looking relieved.

I walked with him to the gate. I was still angry, but we were united in our desperation to find Octavia. Currently, she was all I could think about.

Clarke was standing near the gate, talking to Monty's friend Jasper. He looked utterly terrified, and I remembered the what Monty had told me. No wonder he was scared. He was holding a torch in one hand and a long metal pole in the other. “Clarke, I need to do this,” he said.

“We need all the people we can get,” I agreed. Jasper looked at me and nodded once, then shuffled away. “We need a tracker too,” I added, looking between Bellamy and Clarke expectantly. I didn't know the delinquents—they did.

“Finn. Get out here,” Bellamy called.

“Hey,” Clarke said to me, catching my arm as I turned to walk out the gate. “You need a weapon—something to defend yourself with. The Grounders are out there. If you meet them, you—”

“It's okay, Clarke,” I said. “I've got it covered,” I shared a look with Bellamy and joined the stream of delinquents that were walking out of the camp.

“Finn, we're leaving!” Bellamy shouted.

“All right, I'm coming!” Finn called back.

When I glanced back, he was standing with Clarke. His hair was shorter. Raven must have cut it for him.

“Guys! Guys, look!” someone shouted.

I turned towards the sound of his voice. Everyone had come to a standstill and were gazing up at the sky in wonder. I did the same and I felt the blood drain from my face. Hundreds of shooting stars lit up across the night sky. “It didn't work,” I said. My voice cracked with despair.

Raven appeared beside me. “They didn't see the flares,” she agreed.

“A meteor shower tells you that?” Bellamy spoke up. He was standing across from us with Jasper.

“It's not a meteor shower, it's a _funeral_ ,” Clarke spat. “Hundreds of bodies being returned to the earth from the Ark. This is what it looks like from the other side. They didn't get our message,” she said, looking at Raven and I.

Raven's jaw tightened. “This is all because of _you_!” she snarled. She launched herself at Bellamy, but Finn and Clarke grabbed her and pulled her back.

“I helped you find the radio.” Bellamy said defensively.

“Yeah, after you jacked it from our pod and _trashed_ it!” Raven retorted, the veins on her neck popping out in her rage.

“Yeah, he knows. And now he has to live with it,” Clarke said, trying to calm Raven down.

I shook my head and stepped forward, squaring up to Bellamy. “Raven's right,” I said. “ _Three-hundred_ innocent people are dead because of what you did.” I emphasised.

 


	19. Search Party

BELLAMY WAS SEEMINGLY UNFASED by what I said, but I could see the hurt in his eyes. He cared more about that fact that I hated him, was disgusted by what he had done, than the fact that he was responsible for the deaths of three-hundred innocent people. That only made me angrier.

“All I know is that my sister is out there and I'm gonna find her.” Bellamy said sternly. “You coming or what?” He asked me and Finn.

We both nodded. “Yeah,” Finn said aloud.

“What are we waiting for?!” Bellamy shouted for all the delinquents to hear. “Move out!” He walked away from us and the others followed.

“We have to talk to them,” Clarke said, looking up at the sky at the bodies falling from the Ark. “Three-hundred won't be enough. The oxygen will just keep dropping. And if we don't tell them that they can survive down here, they'll kill more people. They have to.”

“Guys,” Jasper said weakly. “They're leaving—we gotta go.”

Finn made to walk away, but Raven grabbed his hand and stopped him. He turned around and looked at her. “I gotta do this,” he said. “And you should stay and fix the radio, okay?” he added, looking at both Raven and me.

“Fix it?” I scoffed. “The transmitter's smashed.” I told them. “Unless there's a part's depot down here, we're not talking to the Ark.”

Clarke bit her lip and looked at the ground, thinking. Suddenly, she looked back up and it was like a light had turned on behind her eyes. “Art supply store,” she blurted out. “I know a place I might be able to get a transmitter,” she told us.

Finn shifted uncomfortably. _The pencils. The notebook. The art supply store. Finn and Clarke._

“Great,” Raven said. “Looks like you're coming with us instead.”

“Actually...” I paused and Raven looked at me. “Raven, I have to go find Octavia. You can handle the radio alone 'til I get back, right?” I said.

Raven nodded. “I get it,” she said. “You should go.”

“Finn?” Jasper spoke again, more boldly this time. “We're not gonna find her without you.”

“Be careful,” Finn told Clarke and Raven.

“Hey,” Raven grabbed his arm again and pulled him close. She kissed him. “I love you,” she whispered.

“I love you too,” Finn said after a pause.

I say Clarke look away and cleared my throat. “C'mon, Finn. We really gotta go,” I said. He nodded and followed Jasper and I out of the camp.

Once we were through the gate, Finn and I broke into a run to reach the front of the search party. “I know what you're doing,” I said as we ran.

Finn cast a sideways glance at me and frowned. “What?”

“I know about you and Clarke.” I told him. “I've known both of them a long time, Finn, and I won't stand around and watch them get hurt. You better tell Raven the truth before someone else does. She deserves to hear it from you, not through some gossip vine.” I turned my head to look at him. “If you hurt either of those girls, I'll hurt you. Except you won't ever get back up. You got that?” I spat.

Finn nodded and I ran faster. I fell into step with Bellamy, who was leading the group, and Finn caught up a moment later. He walked between Bellamy and I and I could tell it made him feel uncomfortable.

The woods were different at night. Living in space, I didn't think it was possible to be afraid of the dark. I realised I had never seen true darkness. The space between the trees was completely void of light. The glow from our flaming torches only reached so far and beyond the circle of light that surrounded the search party, I couldn't see anything. Even the trunks of the trees faded into the blackness. I told myself not to think about what might be hiding in the shadows, but that only made me think about it more.

The group was quiet. My head snapped towards every small sound. A twig snapped behind me. I looked back and watched as a short boy with oddly large ears lifted his foot from the broken stick. The green canopy of leaves above us rustled in the wind. An owl hooted somewhere in the distance. The dead leaves crunched under our feet. Everywhere I looked, I saw some mangled, horrifying being running towards us. It was all in my head. I knew that, but it didn't help.

Finn picked up a trail of footprints that Bellamy was sure were Octavia's. “This is the last place I saw her. It has to be her,” he told us and marched off in the direction that the footprints led. Everything around me was unfamiliar. We climbed a steep slope and by the time we reached the top, my thighs and calves were burning and I was breathing heavily. We paused at the peak of the hill for just a moment to catch our breath and look at our surroundings, then kept going.

We lost the trail. The rain from earlier in the day had turned the ground to watery slush that covered her footprints. The group spread out through the trees in order to cover more ground. Every time I heard a voice or unusually loud footfall, my hand twitched towards the gun in my waistband. I told myself that it was best to keep it hidden from the delinquents for as long as possible. It was safer if they didn't know that there was a gun in their camp.

“Look! Over here!” Someone shouted through the trees.

I jumped at the sound of their voice but instantly ran towards them. I broke through the treeline before anyone else and joined a tall guy—John, I think was his name—at the top of a small hill. It was more of a small cliff than a hill. The ground fell away at almost a ninety-degree angle for about six or seven meters and then levelled slightly into a less steep incline.

I stood next to John, looking down the cliff and what he was pointing at. I had to squint to see through the darkness. I could just make out something that looked like a piece of fabric snagged on one of the branches of a small tree half way down the slope.

Bellamy came through the trees and stopped on the other side of John. “What is it?” he asked.

“Right there,” he shone his flashlight down at the tree. “You see it? Is that Octavia's?”

“Rope.” Bellamy demanded, reaching out for it to be handed to him.

“Screw this.” I muttered and I jumped over the edge without hesitation.

“Renee!” Bellamy yelled.

I landed safely at the bottom of the cliff, sliding a little on the wet ground. I looked up at the others. Someone had handed him a length of rope and he was frantically uncoiling it. “I'm okay,” I called up.

I continued down the hill, sliding most of the way, and grabbed onto the trunk of the small tree. I untangled the strip of frayed, blue fabric from the branch. I heard Bellamy land with a grunt at the bottom of the cliff. He had used the rope to lower himself down, but somehow still managed to almost lose his balance at the bottom.

He slid down and joined me at the tree. I handed him the rag and he took one look at it and nodded. “It's hers,” he confirmed. “We're going all the way down!” He called up to the others.

He tried to take my hand but I moved out of his reach and scowled. “I can manage.” I snapped. I continued down the hill and stopped when I reached the bottom. I felt boxed in. On one side was the slope and the cliff and on the other was another, slightly less steep, incline covered in densely packed trees.

Bellamy turned on his flashlight when he joined me at the bottom and shone it around the ground, looking for some sign of where Octavia might have gone. A cluster of small rocks caught my eye. I grabbed Bellamy's arm and moved it so that the light shone on the rocks. I crouched down and wiped my fingers across the spots of dark liquid on the stone. It was thick and sticky and smelled metallic.

“It's blood,” I said. I wiped it on my jeans and sighed. “She's hurt,” I stated.

Jasper came flying down the hill, followed closely by Finn. The two of them knelt beside Bellamy and I, glancing around them.

“Someone else was here,” Bellamy realised. I pointed at a footprint in the mud, too large to be Octavia's.

“The prints are deeper going that way,” Finn pointed out.

“He was carrying her,” I whispered gravely.

Jasper shifted next to me. “If they took her, she's alive. Like when they took me,” he said.

I looked at him. “When they took you, they tied you to a tree and left you there as live bait. They also impaled you with a _spear._ ” I said. “I'm sorry if that doesn't fill me with reassurance.”

I stood up and followed the trail of footsteps at a brisk pace. I didn't look back to see if they were following me, but I could hear their footsteps behind me. I reached up as I walked and clasped my hand around my mother's locket. If we didn't find Octavia, or if we did and it was too late, how would I tell Adaline? She cared about Octavia just as much as Bellamy and I did. No. I wouldn't let it come to that. There was no way in hell that I was going to sit in front of my mother and tell her that her best friend's daughter, who she risked her life and mine for, was dead.

I sped into a run. Bellamy called out behind me to slow down and wait for them, but I didn't listen. They could catch up. I clambered over a large, fallen tree. The trunk was almost as thick as I was tall and I couldn't even see the ends of it through the inky blackness in the forest. The leaves blocked out the moonlight. I regretted not grabbing a flashlight or one of the torches. I could barely see, but it was too late to stop or go back to the group.

The footsteps led me along a narrow path that had been cut by years and years of being used as a common route. The ground was trampled and compacted, but he still left behind prints from the added weight of carrying Octavia. I almost tripped as I ran through a sudden dip, but caught my balance and kept going. The path led around a thick cluster of bushed and when I rounded it, I stopped dead in my tracks and gasped at what I saw.

I could only describe it as an entrance to Hell. There were skeletons everywhere— _human_ skeletons. Some were tried to the trees with ropes, others were held in place with spears through their skulls or ribcages. It stunk as well; like rotting flesh. Some of the carcases were clearly fresher than others and still had tissue on the bone.

The light of the delinquents' torches drew closer, casting my shadow across the ground. Their gasps filled the air and a couple of them gagged at the smell. I backed away from that horrible place and bumped right into Bellamy. His hands fell on my hips to steady me, but I pushed him away immediately. He and Finn stood either side of me. I didn't need to look at them to know that they expressions matched my own of pure horror. Up until then, I had underestimated just how _primitive_ the Grounders were.

“I don't speak Grounder,” Finn began, “but I'm pretty sure this means keep out.”

The delinquents behind us muttered among themselves. “Let's get out of here,” one of them said. “This is crazy,” said another.

The kid next to Jasper shook his head. “I'm outa here,” he said and pushed his way back through the search party.

“Go back if you want,” Bellamy said, not looking back. “My sister, my responsibility,” he muttered. He marched forward and I followed, staring at the ground I was stepping on so that I didn't have to look at the skeletons I was passing.

 


	20. The Embodiment of Evil

“I GOT NOTHING.” FINN said. “We lost the trail.”

The sun had risen and the woods were full of sunlight again. There were only eight of us left. Jasper hadn't left my sides since we crossed through the skeleton graveyard. He was terrified and seeking any human comfort that he could find. We hadn't said a word to each other, but it seemed to help him to know that there was someone beside him to save him if he needed saving.

“Keep looking.” Bellamy ordered.

“Wandering around aimlessly isn't the way to find your sister. We should backtrack—” Finn began but Bellamy cut him off.

“I'm not going back.” He snapped.

I took a step forward so that I was half in between them. “Bellamy, calm down,” I said softly. “Finn's right, okay? We're not gonna find Octavia by just... _meandering_ around the trees hoping we find something that will lead us to her.”

“Hey,” one of the other delinquents said, getting our attention. I didn't know her name. “Where's John?” she asked.

We all started looking around for some sign of him but couldn't see him anywhere. “I just saw him a second ago,” Jasper said.

“Spread out,” Bellamy said. “He can't have gotten that far.”

I was about to do as he said when something fell down in front of me. My arms flew up to protect my face as I jumped back, but nothing hit me. My eyes widened. John was lying on the ground, his throat slit and blood spilling out. The cut was jagged and deep and looked like it had been caused by a rope.

“They strangled him,” I muttered quietly. I stumbled back, my back hitting Bellamy's chest, and he caught me. I didn't push him away this time. Instead, I put my hand over his and held it tightly. I hadn't seen a Grounder yet, but I had a feeling I was going to very soon. When Monty told me that the Grounders were brutal and ruthless, I didn't think he meant that they were _this_ bad. I was beginning to wonder whether they were really human. They certainly behaved like animals.

“They use the trees,” Finn realised.

“We shouldn't have crossed the boundary,” the male delinquent said.

“Now can we go back?” one of the girls asked, the same one who had alerted us to John's absence.

“There.” Jasper said suddenly. He pointed through the trees at a figure standing a hundred, two hundred, meters away.

I froze when I saw them and gripped Bellamy's hand tighter—so tightly I was sure it was hurting him. The man was large. He wore animal furs as clothes and his face was covered by a mask made from animal bones. A head-dress with a mohawk of spikes running over his head was attached to the mask. His attire made him all the more menacing and intimidating. A Grounder.

“Another one,” the male delinquent said, pointing out a Grounder running through the trees on our left.

“We should run.” Finn breathed.

A beat passed, and then we did just that. Bellamy kept hold of my hand, forcing me to run with him. I was glad he did. If he hadn't pulled me behind him, I would have stayed where I was, frozen with fear, and probably would've been killed by a Grounder.

My foot snagged on a stick of a tree root and my hand was torn from Bellamy's. My cheek hit the ground and pain shot through my face. I winced as I begun to lift myself. Bellamy was already at my side, hauling me onto my feet. As I got my feet back under me, I realised that it wasn't a stick or a root that I had tripped on. It was a bone. I swallowed the lump in my throat as he urged me to keep running, taking my hand once more.

“What are we gonna do?!” the male delinquent yelled. “They keep heading us off!”

“Just keep running!” Finn called back.

“Bellamy, I can't run much longer,” I panted. My knee was beginning to ache and my limp was getting worse. I wasn't used to this much physical exertion and I was afraid that it was too much for my weaker knee.

“I'm not stopping for her!” the delinquent said, running past Bellamy and I.

Bellamy stopped, looking down at me in concern. “I'm sick of running anyway,” he said as I leaned on him, relieved to no longer be moving.

“Hey, what are you doing?” Finn asked.

“They know where she is.” Bellamy growled.

“Diggs! Diggs, where are you?!” one of the girls yelled, running after the male delinquent.

“Roma!” the delinquent—Diggs—called back.

We went after Roma, following the sound of Diggs' voice. We heard her scream and moved faster. The dull ache in my knee had become a constant pain now. It was bearable, but it wouldn't be for long.

“Wait, Roma!” Finn shouted. “There could be more! Stop!”

He skidded to a halt so abruptly that Bellamy and I almost bumped into him. I looked past him and almost threw up. Diggs stood there, except he wasn't standing. He was being held up by a large, spiked paddle. One of the spikes was lodged in his chest and sticking out of his back.

“Oh my god,” I breathed. “They were leading us here,” I realised. “It's the only direction we could run in.”

“Where'd they go?” Finn asked, looking around.

I looked from side to side and realised that the Grounders were gone.

“After Roma,” Bellamy said.

He went after her. One by one, the others followed him until I was standing alone. I took a deep breath and started running again, gritting my teeth through the pain, and tried not to think about the damage I might be doing to my knee. Like Abby said, it wasn't as strong as it once was. It hurt some nights when I got home. Especially on the days I was out answering work orders all over the Ark, which meant a lot of walking around to get to the different jobs.

I caught up with the others. They were spread out, looking around for Roma. To my relief, they were moving slower than before and I was finally able to keep up with them without my leg feeling like it was going to snap in half.

“There she is!” Called the delinquent whose name I still didn't know. We all looked at where she was pointing. Roma's shoulder was just visible behind a large tree. “Roma!” She called. There was no response.

Bellamy went first, jogging over to the tree. When he got to her, his eyes widened in shock. I walked forward and saw what had shocked him. There was a spear through Roma's chest, pinning her against the tree. I swallowed. They had killed three of us in the space of twenty minutes. My hope that Octavia was still alive was fading fast.

“They're playing with us,” Finn said.

I couldn't take my eyes off Roma. Bellamy noticed and touched my arm. He said something, but I didn't hear him. I just stared at her. I couldn't help but picture Octavia in that same position—pinned to a tree by a spear. Or impaled on a spiked paddle. Or lying on the ground with her throat cut.

“Then they should get it over with!” Jasper suddenly yelled at the top of his lungs, snapping me out of my trance. I grabbed hold of Bellamy's jacket in fright. Finn raced over to him and tried to shut him up but failed. “Come on! We know you're out there! You want to kill us—”

A movement to my left caught my eye and I turned my head. There were two Grounders running towards us. One brandished an axe and the other a sword. “They're coming!” I shouted over Jasper's screaming. I looked around and saw that there were more than just two Grounders. We were surrounded. There was no way out. Bellamy grabbed me suddenly and pushed me behind him, holding up his own tomahawk axe.

I was reaching for my gun when a horn blared. The Grounders stopped in their tracks. There was a pause as the horn filled the forest. They turned and ran in the opposite direction.

“They're leaving,” Bellamy said.

“That horn. What does it mean?” Jasper asked.

“Acid fog,” Finn replied.

I spun around and stared at him in horror. “Did you just say _acid fog_? Are freaking _kidding_ me?!” I exclaimed.

Finn started pulling one of the Dropship's parachutes out of his bag. The nameless delinquent frowned at him. “We have to run,” she said.

Finn shook his head. “There's no time,” he disagreed.

He threw the parachute up to spread it out. We clambered under it, sealing the edges with dry dirt. We were huddled close together. I was pressed tightly against Bellamy. There was no one on my left, which made me feel strangely vulnerable. I couldn't see what was on the other side of the parachute. For all I knew, there could have been a Grounder standing there.

“Hey,” Bellamy whispered, nudging my arm. “You're shaking. Are you okay?”

There was an audible _clunk_ at the back of my throat as I swallowed. “I'd never seen a dead body before,” I admitted, even though he already knew that. “And in the last twenty minutes, I've seen three,” my voice cracked and I shook my head. “We haven't a hope in the world of surviving if this is what the Grounders are capable of.”

Bellamy took my hand. “It's gonna be fine, Ren,” he said softly.

The others were whispered to each other and hadn't heard a word of our conversation. I looked at him, meeting his eyes, and was reminded of everything he had done. I pulled my hand out of his and shuffled as far away from him as I could—which wasn't far. “I know that.” I snapped. The others went quiet at my stern tone and we lay were in silence. I lost track of how long we lay there, but it _felt_ like hours. I knew it couldn't be any more than twenty, maybe thirty, minutes.

“How long are we supposed to wait?” I asked.

“Will this even work?” the nameless delinquent added.

“We'll find out,” Finn replied, answering both our questions.

“No we won't.” Bellamy grumbled and pulled the parachute back, poking his head out. “There's no fog,” he announced, wriggling out from under the parachute.

I sat up and look around. Sure enough, the air was clear. “Maybe it was a false alarm?” I suggested.

“They're coming back,” Bellamy said, spotting a Grounder running through the trees.

“I think he's alone,” Jasper whispered. We all gathered to watch him.

“He doesn't see us,” Bellamy realised. “I'm going after him.” He told us.

I knew from his tone that there was no use arguing with him, but Finn didn't pick up on it. He didn't know Bellamy like I did. He hardly knew him at all. “And what?” He asked. “Kill him?”

“No,” I replied instead, making them all turn to look at me. “We catch him. Make him tell us where Octavia is,” I paused. “ _Then_ kill him.” Bellamy and I shared a look and then a nod. We straightened up from our crouched position behind a fallen tree and jumped over it. My knee felt much better after our short rest and I was able to move much easier and with less pain as a result of my movements. “I've got a bullet meant just for him and I plan on putting it between his eyes.” I muttered so that only Bellamy heard me. He said nothing, but I knew he agreed.

 

 

Bellamy and I watch from behind a large boulder as the Grounder disappeared through the mouth of a cave. The others were hidden in the trees as we waited for it to be safe to come out into the open. “Take out your gun,” Bellamy said to me.

I glanced back. I could just see Jasper and the other delinquent whose name I learned was Monroe hiding behind two trees nearby. “Bellamy—”

“Renee, just do it, okay? They're not gonna mention it to anyone back at camp, trust me,” he said.

I hesitated, but nodded nevertheless and removed the weapon from my waistband. I switched the safety off and pulled the hammer back. There was a soft click as the bullet moved into place. I had hoped that no one would hear it, but Jasper did. His head turned and he spotted the gun in my hand. His eyes widened and he gave me a horrified look.

I ignored it. I knew the minute I stepped through the gate back at camp that we were going to have to get our hands dirty to save Octavia. I had never killed anyone before. I was still rattled just from _seeing_ the three dead bodies that day. I didn't think I was capable of murder, but I knew deep down that if push came to shove and it was either kill someone or let Octavia die, I would go for the former. I wouldn't let her die.

Once we were sure that the Grounder wasn't coming back out, we moved forward. I went first with my gun out in front of me. The cave turned out to be more of a tunnel, winding into the hillside. I saw a light up ahead and slowed. I gripped the gun tighter. I was terrified. I didn't know what I was going to see at the other end of this tunnel. I didn't know if Octavia was even there and if she was, was she alive? Would we discover a relieved young girl or her bloody corpse?

There was no time to stand around wondering. I entered the large cavern at the end of the tunnel and looked around. The Grounder was lying on the ground. His mask had been removed and what I saw underneath was... human. I don't know why I was surprised, but I was. I was surprised to discover that this _monster_ was really a human being under the mask and all the face paint. He was the embodiment of evil and my own gnawing fear.

“ _Renee_?” I familiar voice spoke in the corner.

I looked over and relief washed over me. I felt like I was Atlas, but the world had just been lifted off my shoulders. “Octavia,” I breathed. I ran over, dropping my gun on the ground, and grabbed her face. She was tied to the wall of the cave, the chains wrapped tightly around her wrists. There was a deep cut on her forehead and another on her chin. One of her eyes was bruised.

“Y-you're here,” she whispered, tears welling up in her eyes.

I nodded my head. “Yeah. Yeah, I'm here, O,” I said.

She seemed to snap back into reality because she blinked once and the tears were gone. “The key. Get the key,” she said, pointing at the small silver object on the floor.

I grabbed it as Bellamy came in. He hurried over and helped me untie her restraints. “Monroe, watch the entrance,” he ordered over his shoulder as the others arrived in the cave.

The girl nodded and headed back through the tunnel. As soon as the chains came off Octavia's wrists, she threw her arms around me, clinging to me as if her life depended on it. I clung to her just as desperately, so relieved that she was okay, She was hurt, yes, but she was safe and she was alive.

“How are you even here?” She asked me.

I squeezed her gently and pulled away. “That's a long story for another day,” I replied.

She nodded, accepting my answer, and embraced Bellamy, thanking him for saving her. She let go of her brother and hobbled over to Jasper. “How did you find me?” She asked, falling into his arms.

“Followed him,” Jasper answered, nodding at the unconscious Grounder.

“We should go,” Octavia told us. “Now. Before he wakes up.”

“He's not gonna wake up.” Bellamy growled. I took a spear from the wall and stood over the Grounder, pointing the tip at his chest.

“Bellamy, stop!” Octavia exclaimed. “He didn't hurt me. Let's just go,” she said.

“They started this.” He barked. “Finn, _move_.” He snapped at the younger man who was crouched over the Grounder.

“Foghorn,” he muttered, turning the decorated horn over in his hands.

What happened next was so fast, I barely had time to compute that anyone had moved. The Grounder sprung up and Finn was thrown backwards. He kicked Bellamy's feet from under him. I ran at him and tackled him back onto the ground. He swung at me. I thought he was going to miss, but something stung my upper arm and I yelped, jerking away from him. I looked down. There was a rip in the sleeve of my jacket and blood was oozing out of a thin but deep cut.

Bellamy got back to his feet and kicked the knife out of the Grounder's hand, only to be thrown against the wall by the large man. I grabbed my gun from the floor and aimed it at his head, but he launched himself at me and knocked me onto my back. He pinned me to the ground and wrapped his hands around my neck. He squeezed, cutting off my airway.

“Stop!” Octavia screamed.

There was a muffled _thwack_ and the Grounder fell to the side. I gasped for air, coughing hoarsely. Bellamy dropped the stone he had used to hit the Grounder and helped me up, checking that I was okay.

“Guys,” Jasper said shakily.

We turned around and looked over. He and Octavia were knelt either side of Finn. There was a knife sticking out of his ribs, blood oozing out around the blade. I cursed and hurried over.

Jasper grabbed the handle and was about to pull it out but I stopped him. “No,” I said. “We can't take it out. If we do, it could make it worse. He could bleed to death,” I explained. “We have to get him back to camp. We have to get him back to Clarke.”

 


	21. Storm

RELIEF WASHED OVER ME when I saw the camp walls through the trees. Octavia was being held up between Jasper and I and Bellamy was carrying Finn behind us, the knife still lodged in his side.

“Clarke!” I shouted. “Someone get Clarke!”

We pushed through the gate and Jasper shouted her name again. She came from the direction of the Dropship, frowning. “I'm here,” she said. “What's up?”

We didn't need to answer her. Bellamy came through the gate with Finn. Three other delinquents rushed forward and helped to support his weight.

“Oh my god.” Clarke gasped, her breathing coming out uneven and panicked. She felt for Finn's pulse, trying to contain her terror. “He's alive,” she said.

“They wouldn't let me take the knife out,” Jasper told her.

“No, no, that was a good call,” she said. “Get him in the Dropship. Now. Go!” She ordered the delinquents.

“Clarke!” Raven shouted, grabbing the blonde's arm and stopping her from following them. “Can you save him?” She asked.

Clarke stuttered. “No, not me. I need my mother,” she said. “I need to talk to her.”

“There's still no radio!” Raven snapped, tears sliding down her cheeks.

“Raven, fix it!” Clarke said loudly, desperately.

Raven nodded her head distractedly and ran towards the Dropship. Clarke glanced at me. Her eyes dropped to my arm. “Are you okay?” She asked.

I glanced at the cut on my upper arm, just able to see it through the torn sleeve of my jacket. I nodded. “I'm fine,” I said. “Go. Help Finn.”

She left without hesitation, disappearing into the Dropship.

“Octavia!” Bellamy shouted. The anger in his voice made me turn around. He had grabbed her arm to stop her from walking out of the camp and was standing over her like he was trying to intimidate her. “Why were you defending him?” He demanded, referring to the Grounder.

“Because he saved my life,” she answered. “That spear that hit Roma was actually meant—”

“No, you're wrong.” Bellamy cut her off. “ _I_ saved your life. For all you know, he was keeping you alive to use you as bait for one of their traps.”

“No. I don't think so,” Octavia shook her head, trying desperately to make him understand.

“You don't think, O! That's the problem!” Bellamy shouted at her.

“Bellamy.” I warned in a low tone, but he either didn't hear me or didn't want to hear me.

“They killed three of our people today. And if you would've let me kill him when I had the chance, Finn wouldn't be in there dying right now.” He accused.

“Stop blaming me for your mistakes!” Octavia yelled. “What happened to Finn was not my fault.” She defended. “I wanted to leave, so if Finn dies in there, that's on you!” She stabbed her finger into his chest and he took a step back. “Everything that's gone wrong is because of you. You got me locked up on the Ark. You wanted me to go to that stupid dance. _You_ got mom killed!” She spat.

Bellamy smiled bitterly. “Me?” He said. He sniffed.

“Stop.” I growled, standing between the fighting siblings. “Both of you, stop it right now.”

“Mom was floated for having you. She's dead because you're alive.” Bellamy said, ignoring me. “That was her choice. I didn't have a choice. My life ended the day you were born.” He spoke through gritted teeth.

Octavia took a step back like he had physically hit her. I was equally as shocked by his words. I tried to say something. I wanted to slap him. But I was stunned into silence. Octavia marched away, but she only made it a few steps before her brother grabbed her arm again.

“Where do you think you're going?” He snarled.

“You can't keep me locked up in here forever.” She spat back. She tore her arm from his grip and stormed across the camp to the Dropship, disappearing inside.

“You are un- _fucking_ -believable.” I said, finally finding my voice.

Bellamy looked at me. “This doesn't concern you, Renee.” He said, but I could already see the remorse shining in his dark eyes.

“ _Yes_ , it does,” I retorted. “You think you're the only one who suffered when Aurora died, huh? Well, you _weren't_. I cared about her too. I'm still mourning her _too_. I never knew you could be such a selfish bastard, Blake, but I'm finding out a lot of things about you down here, amn't I?” I took a step closer to him, glaring him down. “What you did out there—saving my life, trying to save Finn's. I was actually starting to think that _maybe_ , just maybe, I could forgive you.” I laughed, but it came out as a horrible scratching bark of humourless cackling. “But now?” I shook my head. “What you just said to her; you'll be lucky if _either_ of us _ever_ forgives you.”

 

 

_Bellamy raised his finger to his lips, telling me to be quiet, before he opened his apartment door. We slipped inside. Octavia was sitting at the table, mending a pair of her mother's trousers. She looked up when we came in._

“ _You'll never guess what's about to happen,” Bellamy said as he shut the door behind us._

“ _Inspection.” Octavia sighed, getting up. “I'll get in the hole.”_

“ _No, no, no, no,” Bellamy grabbed her shoulders and grinned at her. “Sit, sit. This is great.”_

_Octavia rolled her eyes and covered her face with her hands. “Please, Bell, I don't want to hear about another amazing moonrise when I'm never gonna be able to see on,” she said._

“ _You're_ going _to see one right now,” I said. “The Unity Day masquerade dance starts in ten minutes.”_

“ _We didn't want to say anything until I was sure my cadet unit was working security,” I took the blue mask that I had picked out from his chest pocket and laid it on the table in front of her. “I'm gonna be there watching you the entire time.”_

_I punched Bellamy's shoulder playfully. “Creep,” I teased. Bellamy shook his head at me and I laughed. “We'll both be there,” I added, showing Octavia my own mask. It was a similar design to hers but red._

“ _Is this real?” Octavia breathed. She had been waiting for this moment all her life._

_I nodded and picked her mask up from the table. I put it on her and tidied her bangs over the top of it. “There,” I whispered._

“ _How do I look?” She asked, striking a joking pose._

“ _Mysterious,” Bellamy said at the same time as I said, “Beautiful.” Bellamy looked up at me and scowled. “Renee, no. There's gonna be boys—”_

“ _Shut your mouth, Bellamy Blake.” I said, pointing a threatening finger at him. “If you finish that sentence I will take away your ability to have children.” He grimaced and I smiled proudly. “Good boy,” I teased, patting him on the head._

“ _Bell, what about mom?” She asked, though she was smiling, unable to contain her joy and excitement._

“ _Hey, will you stop worrying,” Bellamy said, taking his sister's hand in the hopes of reassuring her. “We'll be back before she even knows you're gone.” He stood up and went to the door, opening it and checking that the coast was clear. “Wanna go for a walk?” He asked Octavia once he confirmed that it was._

_I let the two of them go first. Octavia took his hand and he led her to the door. She hesitated, nervous to step over the threshold and step on ground that she had never before stepped on. I couldn't even begin to imagine how she was feeling. She was nervous, but she was excited. I could see the uncertainty in her posture but her joy overruled it and she followed Bellamy out of the apartment._

“ _It's okay,” Bellamy said, starting to walk down the hallway._

_I shut the apartment door behind me and put a comforting hand on Octavia's shoulder. She smiled at me and started to walk. Her eyes darted everywhere as we made our way through the halls. It was all so new to her. Bellamy walked ahead of us with his hands behind his back; the stance that all the Guard cadets were taught._

_I realised where he was taking her. Her whole face lit up when she saw it. The window. The earth. The moon. She moved closer to the glass and pressed her palm against it._

_I stood close to Bellamy. I leaned closer to speak in his ear. “This is a terrible plan, but a great idea,” I whispered. “I've never seen her so happy.”_

_Bellamy looked down at me. I hadn't seen him this happy in a long time either. “That's because we've never seen her this free before,” he said._

_Voices and footsteps filled the halls and Octavia tensed. It was the first time she had ever seen anyone that wasn't me, Bellamy, their mother, or my mother. We were the only four people in her life, and now there were hundreds of them streaming past her to join the dance._

_She looked back at Bellamy and I, and her brother nodded his head in the direction of the room the dance was being held in. She beamed and followed the other attendees in. I went with her, slipping my mask onto my face, and Bellamy followed us at a distance._

_I was among the oldest there, other than the guards that were on security. It was mostly teenagers that had come, not that I was bothered. I was only there for Octavia. And besides, I had a boyfriend. I didn't go to parties looking to hook with guys anymore. I mean, I never did. But I also didn't say no if it just so happened that a guy I was attracted to was also attracted to me._

_I was separated from Octavia in the jumping, dancing crowd. I could still see her. She looked like she was having a good time. A_ really _good time, actually. I wondered over to the edge of the room where Bellamy stood and leaned against the wall next to him. I could see her better from there. She looked so... free._

“ _You should go dance, Renee,” Bellamy said to me._

_I raised an eyebrow at him and slid my mask onto the top of my head. “What? You don't enjoy my company?” I asked._

_Bellamy rolled his eyes. “You know that's not what I mean.”_

_I shrugged my shoulders. “I've got no one to dance_ with _, Bell,” I pointed out. “I'd rather not stand in the middle of that, looking like an idiot.” Across the room, I spotted a familiar face. Roman's eyes met mine and he broke into a smile. I knew he wouldn't come over. He was working._

“ _Are you kidding me, Ren?” Bellamy scoffed. “You could have any guy in this room, you realise that? They'd kill someone just to_ talk _to you.”_

“ _Bell, I have a boyfriend,” I reminded him._

_Bellamy sucked his teeth. “That's kind of my point,” he said._

“ _I know you don't like him, but I do.”_

_He sighed. “I know, I know, I'm sorry,” he apologised. “I just... You don't seem all that_ happy _when you're with him and it makes me wonder just how 'perfect' you really are for each other,” he admitted._

_I laughed dryly. “I never said we were perfect for each other,” I said. “Besides,” I continued, eager to change the subject, “I'd rather not have some random guy grinding on me when I can't even see his face. Especially not with a certain someone_ watching _,” I told him, nodding across the room to where Roman stood._

“ _Shit,” Bellamy mumbled, looking down. “I didn't even realise he was here.”_

_He was quiet for a moment and then I heard him grunt angrily. I followed his gaze to the dance floor. A boy was speaking to Octavia. He was taller than her but I guessed he was around her age, maybe a year or two older. He had blonde, curly hair and his mask covered most of his face._

_Bellamy made a move to go over, but I grabbed his arm and forced him to stay put. “Don't you dare.” I said firmly._

“ _Renee, he—”_

“ _She's a sixteen-year-old girl, Bellamy.”_

“ _A sixteen-year-old girl who's never left her apartment before.”_

_I glared at him. “Let her have this, Bell. It's probably the only opportunity she's ever gonna get,” I pointed out._

_The music stopped suddenly and the lights came on before he could agree or disagree. “_ Solar flare alert. _” The tannoy spat out. “_ An X-class solar flare has begun on the starboard side of the Ark. All citizens must report to the nearest shelter zone immediately. This is not a test. This is a solar flare alert. _”_

_I could see Octavia darting around the crowded room, trying to find the exit or Bellamy and I. We rushed towards her, Bellamy catching her wrist and pulled her close. We headed for the door, but were cut off by a group of guards coming down the hall with scanners._

“ _ID chips ready.” One of them called._

_I grabbed the two siblings and pulled them in the other direction. “We need to get her home.” I hissed at Bellamy._

“ _We will.” He assured me._

“ _Ladies and gentlemen.” Shumway called as he entered the room. God, I hated that sleaze-bag. “You know the drill. Masks off. ID chips out.”_

“ _Bell, what do we do?” Octavia asked, breathing heavily from the panic._

“ _Listen to me,” Bellamy said, leaning down so that their faces were level. “Whatever happens, you get back home and get under the floor. You'll be safe there from the flare, like always.” He told her._

“ _What're you gonna do?” She asked._

“ _Create a distraction,” he said, taking out his shock-baton. “Go on.” He urged._

“ _Bell!” She grabbed his arm. “How do I get home?”_

_Bellamy looked at her, then at me, and then back at her. He didn't know what to do. He was all out of ideas. Octavia had never been out of their apartment before—she had no idea how to get back._

“ _Bellamy, do something. I'll get her home.” I whispered, taking Octavia's hand in mine._

_Before we could get away, that_ rat _approached us and dread washed through me. “Cadet Blake,” Shumway said. “Why is your weapon out?” He asked. He looked at Octavia. “Mask off.” He spat, removing the mask from her face himself. I had to fight the urge to shove him away from her._

“ _Uh, Sir, she's— she's fine. I already scanned her,” Bellamy interjected, moving to stand in front of Octavia and I._

_Shumway looked down. “You don't have a scanner.” He pointed out. “ID chip, please.” He said to Octavia and then glanced at me. “Both of you.”_

“ _Please, Lieutenant Shumway, I'm begging you, she needs to leave,” Bellamy said quickly. “As a fellow guardsman... just let us walk out of here and I'll do anything you want._ Anything _.” He pleaded._

_Lieutenant Shumway wasn't someone who could be bargained with. He was heartless. “You are not a guardsman yet,_ cadet _,” he spat put. “ID._ Now _.” He demanded. Octavia ran. She sprinted across the room towards the exit. “Stop her!” Shumway shouted._

_The two guards by the door grabbed her and held onto her. It was over. There was nothing Bellamy or I could do. It was all over... and it was our fault._

 

 

I left Bellamy standing at the gate. It was always the same when he got angry. He said things that he didn't really mean and then it would take a minute or two for it to sink in. Then, that look of pain and guilt and sadness would come over his features. That was when I knew I had to walk away because if I didn't, I knew that I would give in to the urge to hug him and tell him that I forgave him and it was all going to be okay.

I knew I should hate him, and part of me did, but it was impossible to just switch off and stop caring for him. Or anyone, for that matter, but especially Bellamy. I had known him for so long. He had been there every day of my life. Yes, we had fallen out before; we had argued. But never like this. I had never felt like this about him. I had _never_ hated him before and it felt so... wrong. I wished that I could go back in time and change everything he did.

I paused at the top of the Dropship ramp, peering over at where Finn lay unconscious in a makeshift bed. Clarke was next to him, checking his vitals with teary eyes. I remembered my promise to him. I meant it and it still stood, even if he was on his deathbed.

“Have you seen Octavia?” I asked the two girls standing near the door.

One of them pointed to the ladder. “She went up,” she told me.

I thanked her quickly and clambered up the ladder. Octavia wasn't on the second level, so I kept going up to the third. I found her there, huddled in the corner. She wasn't crying, like I had expected. Instead, she was staring at a point on the floor with enough intensity to set it ablaze.

_She is so like him._

“Hey,” I said softly, getting her attention.

She lifted her gaze from the floor for a brief moment to look at me and then resumed her glaring. “Hi.” She said.

I knew she wasn't angry with me, but the coldness in her tone still sent a shiver down my spine. A lot more than her appearance had changed in Lockup and on the ground. “Are you okay?” I asked. I went over and sat next to her, leaving a little distance between me and her.

She nodded her head. “I'm fine.” She replied.

“Okay, that's the bullshit out of the way. Now tell me the truth.” I said, matching her tone. She looked at me, eyes widening a little. I realised I had never sworn in front of her before. Bellamy and I were always so careful about our language when we were around her, not wanting our bad habits to rub off on her. “I'll ask you again: _are you okay_?” I repeated.

This time, her shoulders sagged and tears welled in her eyes. The facade she had learned to uphold in the Skybox fell away and I saw the real Octavia. “He's been completely different since we came down,” she whispered. “I think it's because—” She stopped and looked at me uncertainly.

I knew she knew. “Because he shot the Chancellor,” I finished for her.

Octavia nodded, seemingly relieved that I already knew what her brother—my best friend—had done. “He _murdered_ someone,” she whispered in disbelief.

“He didn't,” I said. “He didn't murder anyone. Jaha's still alive,” I told her. “They found him in time and saved him.”

Octavia frowned. “I... I didn't realise,” she said. “I thought... I was so angry when I found out. I thought he killed him.”

“Trust me, Jaha's alive. I saw him. He was walking and everything,” I smiled. “He's pretty bent out of shape, what with being shot in the gut and everything, but he is very much alive up there. Bellamy isn't a murderer. I'm hoping that now that he knows that, things will change. He helped us today. Yeah, he also totally screwed up with the radio, but at least he's _trying_ to make amends.”

“You hate him,” Octavia stated.

I nodded. “Yeah, I do right now. But I won't forever,” I said.

Suddenly, the brunette threw her arms around me and hugged my side. I smiled and put my arms around her shoulders, holding her gently. “I'm really glad you're here,” she whispered. “I don't think I've ever needed you more than I do right now.”

Her words touched my heart and made me feel a whole lot better about everything. At least my coming to the ground hadn't been a total waste of time and energy. Maybe when Raven and I were rebuilding the pod I had been thinking primarily of Bellamy, but I was thinking of Octavia too. I felt a little bad that I hadn't thought about her more. She was, after all, less capable of looking after herself than Bellamy was. I had a feeling, however, that that might be changing. She wasn't the same timid girl that I had watched the guards drag away, nor the one I had visited on that one occasion in the Skybox.

She was different in the same way that Clarke was different, and Monty, and even Bellamy. All four of them I had known on the Ark, before they were either locked up or came to the ground by choice.

Clarke was much like her father. She wasn't like the other girls from Alpha Station. She wasn't stuck up, she was humble. Monty came from a family of farmers with parents that were born into the trade. He broke tradition by joining the Engineering training program. He was funny, but he was shy. It took a while for him to come out of his shell and realise that it was okay to speak to me and that just because he was shadowing me, it didn't mean he had to _be_ a shadow.

Bellamy. On the Ark, Bellamy was selfless. Everything he ever did was either for his sister or for me. It was still the same as far as Octavia was concerned. He had shown me that I was expendable, though. I understood. I wasn't angry that his sister was more important to him, I was angry that he pretended like he cared about me so much when he was willing to let me die to save himself. That was okay. Except he _lied_ about it and told me he loved me.

 

 

The rain started and the wind came with it. It howled and the stronger gusts were enough to shake the Dropship. The radio was working, but we were yet to make contact with the Ark. I had been speaking into the mouthpiece for almost an hour, repeating the same sentence over. I knew I had the right frequency, but they couldn't hear me, or maybe I couldn't hear them.

I had tied my hair up and thrown my hat aside. The wind blowing into the Dropship through the door behind me kept blowing my hair into my face and I couldn't see what I was doing. Clarke had put a clean bandage around my upper arm, over the cut left behind by the Grounder's knife. It didn't hurt. It was more of a burning throb.

“This Renee Olson, calling Ark Station. Come in, Ark Station.” I repeated for what felt like the millionth time. I sat back, throwing the mouthpiece onto the table beside the radio, and took a deep breath. I rubbed my temples to relieve some of the stress.

“Keep going,” Clarke said from beside Finn. She and Raven had made him as comfortable as they could. There wasn't anything else they could do without Abby.

“Clarke... I've been trying for nearly an hour. The storm... it's—”

“Renee, I don't care.” She interjected. “Please, just get the damn thing working,” she begged.

“It _is_ working, Clarke. The radio works, they're just not hearing me. I think it's interference from the storm. We may not be able to contact them until it passes,” I explained.

Clarke shook her head, fearing for Finn. “We may not have that long,” she said.

The desperation in her eyes was enough to make me sit up straight once more. I grabbed the mouthpiece and tried again. I adjusted the frequency slightly a few times, but still got nothing. Every so often, I would feel my hope slip away. But then I would look at Clarke and Raven and I would see the terror on their faces; I would look at Finn and the knife still stuck in his ribs. I had to have hope—for them.

Bellamy came into the Dropship not long after that. He was drenched from head to toe, rainwater dripping from his hair which was plastered to his forehead. “Drew. Miller.” He barked and two boys' heads lifted. They emerged from the small cluster of delinquents behind the ladder and stood close to them as he muttered something too quiet for me to hear.

“Raven,” I said, turning to the tanned girl. “Can you take over for a bit?” I asked.

She took a long look at Finn and nodded. She stood from her seat beside him and took my place at the radio.

I strode over to where Bellamy stood with the two delinquents and grabbed his arm before he could leave the Dropship again. “I know what you're planning,” I said. “You're going back for the Grounder.” He opened his mouth, preparing for me to protest and try to talk him out of it, but I clamped my hand over his mouth and prevented him from speaking. “There were weapons in his cave. Much better than what we have here. Grab some of them—we could use them for hunting. And if there's anything else that looks like it might be useful, take that too. Medicine, food, anything.”

Bellamy raised an eyebrow and moved my hand off his mouth. “You're not going to try and stop me?” He asked.

I folded my arms. “Why on earth would I do that?” I retorted.

He watched me suspiciously for a moment, but then seemed to accept that I agreed with him and nodded his head. “We'll take as much as we can carry back with us,” he promised. He nodded to Drew and Miller and they walked down the ramp, out into the rain.

The cold, metal object in my waistband suddenly seemed to burn my skin. I called his name and ran after him. The drops of rain were large and stung a little when they hit my skin. I forgot to slow down as I approached him where he had stopped to wait and almost crashing into him. I caught his arm and steadied myself on the slippery ground.

I reached under my top and took the gun out, pressing it into his hand. “Take it. You might need it if he wakes up,” I said.

Drew and Miller's eyes almost popped out of their sockets when they saw the weapon. They shared a look and then stared at me in shock.

I ignored them and trained my eyes on Bellamy's face, still holding his arm. “Be careful,” I told him.

He smiled slightly and nodded once. Drops of water flew off his hair with the movement. I let him go and he turned and walked out the gate with Drew and Miller following close behind. I sent a silent prayer to a god I didn't believe that Bellamy didn't die out there and went back to the Dropship.

Raven was still at the radio, begging them to hear her. I touched her shoulder gently and told her that I could take over again. She went straight back to Finn's side, taking his sweaty hand in hers. I was cold. The short time I had spent out in the rain had left me completely soaked. My clothes clung to my body and my hair was heavier than usual from all the water that was trapped in it.

“This is Renee Olson,” I resumed the mantra. “Calling Ark Station. Come in, Ark Station. This is Renee Olson. Calling Ark Station. Please come in.” Still, all I got back was static. I clenched my jaw and spoke again through gritted teeth, “Goddammit, can anybody _hear_ me?”

“Are you sure you have the right frequency?” Monroe—the girl that was with us when we were looking for Octavia—queried.

I glared at her. “Yeah, I'm sure.” I snapped.

“Renee,” Clarke said. I looked at her and she held eye-contact with me for a moment before she continued. “You can do this, okay?”

I glanced over at Raven, clinging to Finn's hand like it was her only lifeline... or like she was his. “I have to,” I whispered. No one heard me. “Calling Ark Station,” I said, turning back to the radio and leaning over it. “Ark Station, please come in. I'm on the ground with the Hundred. We _need_ you,” I paused, waiting for a reply, but didn't get one. “Are you there? Please come in,” I continued in a pleading tone. “Calling Ark Station. The Hundred are alive.”

The radio crackled and then the static faded slightly. I held my breath. “This is a restricted channel,” a male voice came from the radio's speakers and joy like nothing I had felt before washed over me. At the sound of someone on the other end of the radio, the delinquents in the room gathered around in amazement. “Who is this? Please identify yourself.” He demanded.

“This is Renee Olson. I-I'm from Factory Station,” I stammered in my excitement. “I'm transmitting from the ground. The Hundred are _alive_ ,” I told them. I was still trying to come to terms with the fact that we were _finally_ speaking to the Ark and they were hearing us. “Please, you need to get Doctor Abby Griffin. Doctor _Abigail_ Griffin. Now.” There was a long pause and I was afraid that we had lost the connection. “Hello?” I said, my voice unsteady. “Can you still hear me?”

The radio crackled. “Renee? Are you there?” Abby's voice came through.

I looked back at Clarke and handed the mouthpiece to her with a small, reassuring smile. She took it from me and sat in the seat in front of the radio. “Mom? Mom, it's me,” she said.

“Clarke?” Abby said.

“Mom, I need your help.” Clarke said, skipping the pleasantries. “One of our people was stabbed by a Grounder.”

“Clarke,” it was Jaha now. “This is the Chancellor. Are you saying there are survivors on the ground?” He asked.

Clarke took a deep breath. “Yes. The earth is survivable. We're not alone.” She announced.

I could imagine their faces. They probably looked much like mine had when Monty told me.

“Mom, he's dying. The knife is still in his chest,” Clarke pressed, eager to get off the topic of the Grounders and back to saving Finn's life.

“Okay, we'll be right with you,” Abby said.

“Clarke.” The Chancellor again. “Is my son with you?”

Her face fell. She opened her mouth but no words came out. I gently pried the mouthpiece out of her hand and raised it to my lips. “Chancellor, this is Renee Olson,” I announced myself. “I'm so sorry, Sir. Wells is dead.” I hated to deliver such awful news to him, but I knew that it was easier for me to do it than it was for Clarke. Wells was her best friend. It would be like me telling Bellamy's mother that he was dead. I would never be able to do that either.

There was a long pause as the people on the other end of the radio spoke away from the radio. We couldn't hear them. Clarke went back over to Finn, getting ready for her mother's instructions.

“I'm going to talk you through it, step by step,” Abby said at last. The wind howled stronger outside and something hit the outer wall of the Dropship. “Clarke... just... find...” Abby's voice wavered in and out.

“What?” Clarke looked over. “Renee, what's wrong?” She asked.

“It's not the radio,” I said, fiddling with the dials on the device to try and maintain the connection with the Ark. “It's the storm,” I told her.

The radio crackled and we heard Abby's voice again. “Clarke, we need to hurry,” she said.

 

 

Octavia hurried into the Dropship. The storm outside was getting worse and she was dripping wet. She carried a flask in each hand. Clarke took one from her and unscrewed the top, sniffing it. She grimaced. “Monty's moonshine?” She mused.

Octavia nodded. “Pretty sure no germ could survive it,” she said.

A gust of wind blew through the camp, making the Dropship shudder, and there was a loud crash from outside that made us all turn to look out. “Storm's getting worse,” Clarke said. “Monroe, close the doors.”

“But we still have people out there,” Monroe pointed out hesitantly, glancing from Clarke to me.

“Monty and Jasper still aren't back yet,” Octavia said.

“Nor is Bellamy,” I added, surprising myself. The words just came out without me even thinking. That's the trouble with caring about someone—it never turns off, even when you're pissed at them.

“It's okay, they'll find somewhere to ride it out,” she said, nodding at Monroe.

The girl reached for the lever that would shut the doors, but I stood up and stopped her. “No way. That door isn't closing until Bellamy gets back.” I said firmly. “Trust me, Clarke, he'll be trying to get back.”

“One stitching needle,” Raven interrupted before it turned into an argument. She handed Clarke a thin, curved needle.

“Great,” Clarke said, taking the needle from her. “We still need something to close the wound,” she added.

“There's some wire on the second level. I used it for the tents,” Octavia suggested.

“Let me see it,” Clarke nodded. Octavia nodded and hurried away.

“Stay away from the blue wires that run through the ceiling,” Raven called after her as she placed her hand on one of the rungs of the ladder. “I rigged them to the solar cells on the roof,” she explained.

Octavia kept going, not responding. “That means they're hot! You got that?” I shouted after her.

“Yeah, I got it,” she called back down.

I wondered closer to the door, peering out into the stormy darkness for any signs of Bellamy and the others coming back. All I saw was rain and blackness that looked like no light could penetrate it. Earth definitely wasn't what I imagined it would be.

I was just about to turn away when a movement on the other side of the camp caught my eye. I squinted, stepping out of the shelter of the Dropship and into the downpour. “They're back!” I yelled when I recognised Bellamy. He reached the Dropship and ran up the ramp.

“Bellamy!” Octavia exclaimed, coming down the ladder. She tossed the wire to Clarke and ran over, but she stopped dead when she saw Drew and Miller. They were hauling the Grounder's unconscious body between them. “The hell are you doing?” She seethed.

“It's time to get some answers.” Bellamy said.

“Oh, you mean 'revenge'?” Octavia corrected bitterly.

“I mean 'intel'.” Bellamy retorted. He looked over his shoulder at Drew and Miller. “Get him upstairs.” He ordered.

“Bellamy, she's right,” Clarke said, walking over.

“Who cares.” I said. Octavia and Clarke both stared at me in shock. “They killed how many of our people?” I reminded them. “So what if it's revenge? As long as it tastes sweet, right?”

I had never seen either of those girls look so disgusted by something I had said. It should have bothered me, but it didn't.

The radio buzzed loudly. “Clarke, we're ready,” Abby said. “Can you hear me?” She asked after a short pause.

Bellamy stared at the radio with a mixture of surprise and fear. Of course he was afraid. He knew what the radio being fixed meant for him. Eventually, he was going to have to face up to what he did to Jaha.

“Look,” Clarke said, stepping closer to Bellamy and I and ignoring her mother for the time being. “This is not who we are,” she tried to convince us.

Bellamy looked between the radio and Clarke. He pulled himself up straight, forgetting his fear. “It is now.” He said. He strode away and climbed the ladder, going up to join Drew and Miller with the Grounder.

I turned to Clarke. “Forget about that now,” I said. “Just help Finn. I'll do what I can to keep the connection between us and the Ark. Just focus on Finn, okay?” I told her. She nodded and hurried back over to his makeshift bed. I sat at the radio and took the mouthpiece. “Abby? We're ready,” I said. I grabbed a roll of tape as she spoke to Clarke and wrapped it around the mouthpiece so it held the button down, allowing them to hear everything without one of us having to hold it down ourselves the whole time.

“The blade is at a sharp, upward angle. Between his sixth and seventh rib,” Clarke told her mom.

“Okay, how deep?” Abby asked.

Clarke paused. “Well, I can't tell how deep it goes,” she replied.

I thought for a moment. “The blade was an inch, maybe two,” I said. “I don't know exactly. I only saw it briefly before the Grounder stabbed him,” I announced.

“That's okay,” Abby said calmly. “Just don't remove the knife yet,” she emphasised.

“Hey, here,” Clarke said, handing a pacing Raven one of the flasks of Monty's moonshine. “Sterilize your hands.”

Raven took the flask and brought to her lips. She threw her head back and took a long swig, then poured it over her hands. She held it out to me, but I shook my head. “Nuh-uh. Don't worry, I'm not going anywhere near him,” I said. “I hate blood.”

“Clarke, do you see any fluids?” Abby asked.

Clarke leaned in closer to check. I peeked briefly and had to look away. There was a cloth wrapped around the base of the knife, but I still couldn't look at it. She tried to speak, but two delinquents started fighting behind her. “Dammit!” She exclaimed.

I marched towards the two fighting delinquents and grabbed both their collars, tearing them apart. “Enough!” I shouted and the entire room went quiet. “Everyone! Upstairs. Now!” I ordered. They did as I said, filing up the ladder to the second level. I shoved one of the boys that had been fighting to the front of the line and left the other at the back. I was pretty eager to get out of there myself.

I was the last to climb the ladder. The second level was crowded. There were at least eighty kids crammed into that small space. I kept climbing and pulled myself through the hatch on the top level. Bellamy spun around when he heard me come in, but relaxed when he saw that it was me. The Grounder was tied up, his arms spread-eagle. He was still unconscious.

“Has he woken up at all?” I asked. Bellamy shook his head and said nothing. I looked up at him and frowned. There was a bruise forming under his eye. It wasn't there the last time I saw him. “Did he do that?” I reached up and brushed my thumb over the bruise.

Bellamy winced and grabbed my hand, pulling it away from his face. “Yeah, he did,” he confirmed. “He woke up when we were on our way back. Miller hit him pretty hard,” he explained, looking over at the teenager. He was tying ropes around the Grounder's wrists with Drew. “It might be a while 'til he wakes up.” I glanced back at me. “How's Finn doing?”

Before I could answer, the Grounder grunted loudly and jerked forward. Drew and Miller held him.

“Hey, tie him! Tighter!” Bellamy exclaimed, rushing over to help them. “Last thing we need is this bastard escaping because you screwed up!” He barked at the two boys.

I shook my head at him, glaring at the back of his head. I would never be able to go from genuinely concerned about someone's wellbeing to an egotistical maniac in a matter of seconds. It was honestly incredible.

The Grounder went quiet and stopped struggling. I thought for a moment that he was staring at me, but I quickly realised that it was something behind me. I looked back. Octavia had come through the hatch and was looking back at him, horrified. She didn't look like she was afraid of him, though. I was surprised. _I_ was afraid of him.

“Octavia. Get out of here.” Bellamy said, stepping between her and the Grounder.

“I told you,” Octavia said lowly. “He was _protecting_ me. You didn't have to do this.”

“This isn't about you,” Bellamy told her, but we all knew he was lying. “I'm doing this for all of us,” he continued.

Octavia looked at the Grounder. “You did _that_ for all of us?” She pointed at his bloodied, swollen face.

“No,” Bellamy shook his head. “I did that for Finn. And Jasper. And John, and Diggs, and Roma.”

“It wasn't even him!” Octavia exclaimed.

“You don't know that!” Bellamy shouted at her. “We need to know what we're up against! How many there are and _why_ they're killing us.” He paused and looked at the Grounder. “And he's gonna tell us right now.”

He took a step closer to the Grounder, cracking his knuckles, but Octavia grabbed his arm and held him back. “No, Bellamy, please!” She begged. “I was there!”

“Miller, get her out of here,” Bellamy said over her pleading voice.

Miller did as he was told and grabbed hold of Octavia. The Grounder grunted and pulled on his restraints as he did. “Get-get off me!” She shouted, shoving him away.

I caught her as she stumbled away from him and held onto her firmly but gently. “O, please. Just go downstairs,” I said.

She glared up at me, angrier than I'd ever seen her. “Why aren't you doing something?!” She spat. “Why are you _condoning_ this?!”

“Because I _saw_ what his people did to those three kids. I saw what _he_ did to Finn.” I said, pointing an accusing finger at the Grounder tied up in our Dropship. “And I can't stop thinking, what if that had been you. What the hell would I do if one of them killed _you_?” I told her.

Octavia shrugged me off and went to the hatch. “I don't even think he speaks English.” She said. “He won't understand you.” She glared at each of us one last time and climbed down the ladder. Miller shut the hatch behind her.

I stepped past Bellamy and looked at the Grounder. He was six or seven inches taller than me. The top of my head came to his shoulder. I stared into his eyes, which were darker even than Bellamy's. There was no warmth in them, though. All I saw was anger and hate. It was understandable. I was sure the same emotions were reflected in my blue eyes as I looked at him.

I smiled wryly. “We'll make him understand.” I said, even though Octavia was well out of earshot. I wasn't saying it for _her_ to hear.

 


	22. 103

AS PER MY REQUEST, Bellamy and the two delinquents brought back a few things from the Grounder's cave. I was eating berries from a small pouch. When I found it, I was reluctant to eat it, but Drew told me that he had already had some and they were fine. After telling him what an idiot he was for eating fruit he found in a _Grounder's_ gave, I started eating them myself.

They had taken back mostly knives and axes by way of weapons. There was one thing, however, that I found myself picking up and turning over in my hands. A bow. It was long. When I put one end on the floor, the other reached my chest. The upper and lower limbs were decorated with beautiful patterns. There were leaves and trees and birds carved into the wood. Someone had taken a lot of time to make it look nice.

There was something so elegant about it. That was what drew me to it. It was elegant and beautiful, but it was deadly.

There was a quiver of arrows with it. The quiver had a similar print in its leather as the bow. It was such an archaic weapon, like all the other weapons that the Grounders used, but it was far from barbaric. Unlike their swords and axes and spears.

“Are you about done oggling that bow?” Bellamy said, looking at me with amusement from where he stood a couple of meters away, “You look like—” He was cut off by a loud bang. We both jumped. “What was that?” He barked.

“It's fine. Probably just a tree falling,” I said. I smirked at him. It was my turn to be amused. “You look like you shit your pants,” I joked.

Bellamy scowled at me, his cheeks turning a light shade of pink. I suddenly remembered that we weren't alone. There were two teenagers _and_ a Grounder in the room with us. “Shut up, Renee,” he grumbled, but I could tell he was suppressing a smile.

This felt normal. Us joking around. Me making him blush. Him trying not to smile. That was us. This was what I had missed so much when I was on the Ark and he was on the ground. Now we were both on the ground and things weren't right between us. How was it possible to still miss someone so much when they were right in front of me?

I suddenly thought about the moment I found him in the woods. That was before I knew that he trashed the radio and forced people to take their wristbands off, all to stop the rest of the Ark from coming down and joining them. In that moment, everything was perfect. We were on the ground. We were together. We were _in love_. I had kissed him. My cheeks warmed and I realised that _I_ was blushing now.

I stood up and paced over to him. “Bellamy,” I said softly, too quietly for any of the others to hear. “I—”

I was cut off by a deafening crash and the whole Dropship lurched violently. We were all thrown off our feet. I crashed painfully into the floor, hitting my head, and cried out in pain. My head throbbed and tears stung my eyes. Crates and boxes toppled over around me. I brought my arms up over my head to protect myself as they rained down on top of me.

The Dropship stilled and I lowered my arms, looking around. One thought went through my head. I looked at the man tied up on the other side of the room. The ropes had held him up, but he was slumped forward. “Grounders.” I breathed.

Bellamy kicked a box out of his way and crouched next to me, helping me sit up. “Are you okay?” He frowned, cradling my face. “You're bleeding,” he said, touch my forehead gently.

I winced and hissed in pain, pulling away from him. I reached up and tapped the spot just about my eyebrow with the heel of my hand. Sure enough, my palm came away stained crimson. “Crap,” I muttered. “I'm okay. It doesn't hurt,” I lied. I started to push myself up but I lost my balance. Bellamy caught me and lifted me onto my feet. “Thanks,” I said. He didn't let go of me and I was glad. My head was spinning and I felt like I was going to throw up.

“What the hell was that?” Bellamy said to no one in particular, keeping a firm grip on my waist.

“I'll go check,” Drew said and disappeared down the ladder.

Bellamy took one hand off my waist and touched my cheek affectionately. My heart fluttered. I felt like I was a teenager again, falling in love for the first time. “Are sure you're okay?” He whispered, seeming to forget that Miller and the Grounder were still in the room with us. I forgot too.

“Yeah,” I said. “I'm okay.”

He frowned concernedly. I pressed the back of his hand to my other cheek and then my forehead. “Ren, you feel kind of warm,” he said. His frown deepened. “You're burning up, actually. Maybe Clarke should have a look at you,” he suggested.

“Really, Bellamy, I'm okay,” I said. I moved away from him and started to help Miller pick up the things that had fallen over. “It's probably just being cooped up in here. The air is hardly fresh,” I pointed out. I didn't want to admit that I _was_ burning up. At the time, I thought it was just because of Bellamy. It wouldn't be the first time he'd had that effect on me.

I grabbed a lamp and hung it back up on the wall as Drew came back through the hatch. “What the hell was that?” I asked. “We under attack or not?”

Drew shook his head. “Storm damage,” he informed us. “We're okay.” He smiled kindly at me and held out a damp rag. “For your head,” he said.

“Thanks,” I said. I did my best to keep the surprise out of my voice and took the rag from him, pressing it against the cut above my eyebrow. I could feel Bellamy's eyes on us but I didn't turn around.

“We're gonna try this one last time.” He started, taking his gaze off of me and Drew and fixing it on the Grounder. “What's your name?” Nothing. “Where's your camp?” Silence. “How many of you are there?” Just like the last fifty times Bellamy asked, the Grounder didn't say a word.

“Hey,” Miller called. He was crouched on the floor, looking in a small tin. “Check it out.”

We all gathered around him and peered at the viles in the tin box. I took it from his hands and frowned. “What is all this stuff?” I wondered out loud.

“Who the hell knows with these people?” Bellamy grumbled. He rummaged around in the Grounder's small bag and pulled out a leather-bound book. He untied the string that was keeping it closed. Suddenly, the Grounder lunged forward and pulled against his restraints. Bellamy smirked. “Looks like we found something he doesn't want us to see,” he said, opening the book and flipping through the pages. I looked over his shoulder.

“These aren't half bad,” I commented, looking at the drawings and then over at the Grounder. “Maybe we captured an artist and not a warrior,” I chuckled. Drew and Miller laughed too, but Bellamy went stiff beside me. I looked back down at the book. It was open on a page with a drawing of a girl. There was no mistaking who the girl was. It was Octavia.

Bellamy glared at the Grounder and turned to the next page. “It's our camp,” he mumbled. On one side, there was a detailed drawing of the Dropship and the wall. The other was filled with lines—tallies. “Guessing that all these marks add up to a hundred and three. Ten are crossed out.” He glanced at me and handed me the book, standing up. “That's how many people we've lost,” he summarised, sauntering towards the Grounder. “You've been watching us ever since we got here.” He accused.

I stood back, turning through the pages of the Grounder's journal. It was mostly drawings, some writing. But it wasn't in English. I didn't understand it. “What the hell is that thing?” I muttered, coming across a drawing of a strange shadow-figure. I glanced at the Grounder and turned the book around to show him the page. “Friend of yours?” I asked, raising an eyebrow. He glanced at the book but didn't react.

The hatch creaked behind me as it opened and Clarke climbed through. Drew stood in her way. She stood in front of him and looked up at him, not even batting an eye. “Get the hell out of my way.” She snarled.

“It's okay,” I muttered, turning to the next page of the Grounder's book. “Let her through.”

Drew stepped aside and Clarke brushed past him, irritated. She stopped when she saw the Grounder. He had been hidden from her view by the wall. She took in the blood all over his face. His swollen eye. “Well if he didn't hate us before, he does _now_.” She spat at Bellamy and I.

Bellamy grabbed her arm and pulled her over to where I stood. “Who cares?” He shrugged, nonchalantly. “How's Finn?” He asked.

“Alive,” Clarke replied dismissively. “His _people_ will care. How long until they figure out where he is? And what happens when they do? I mean when they come looking for him? They _will_ , Bellamy.”

“Relax, Princess. No one saw us take him,” Bellamy sighed. “He was chained up in that cave the whole time and thanks to the storm you couldn't see a soul on the way back.”

“I say let them come,” I put in. There was a loud bang on the roof of the Dropship that made us all jump and look up. I handed her the book once we recovered from, open at the drawing of the Dropship. “In case you missed it, his people already killing us. We're already fighting a war that has to end at some point.”

Clarke paused and eyed me carefully. “Are you feeling okay?” She asked. She reached out and touched my brow. “You're burning up. And you're pale,” she pointed out.

I pulled out of her reach and her arm fell back at her side. “I'm fine,” I dismissed.

She sighed and continued. “We're not soldiers,” Renee,” she said. She looked at Bellamy. “ _Look_ at him,” she pointed at the Grounder. “We can't win.”

“You're right, we can't,” Bellamy went on. “If. We don't. Fight.” He emphasised each word with a dip of his head.

“Clarke!” Raven's desperate voice called up from the bottom level. “He's seizing!”

“On my way!” Clarke shouted back, hurrying down the ladder.

I went after her, leaving the others alone with the Grounders. I reached the bottom and ran to Finn's bed with Clarke. He was shaking uncontrollably and his muscles were all tense.

“Get my mom on the radio now!” Clarke ordered. “Raven!” She yelled when the mechanic didn't move.

“Th-the radio's dead; interference from the storm,” she finally replied, snapping back into reality. Clarke and I held Finn's shoulders as he convulsed. “Please...” Raven croaked. “Don't let him die,” she breathed desperately, pleading.

“He's not gonna die,” I reassured her when Clarke said nothing.

Finn's skin was clammy and it was difficult to hold onto him. I extended my arm across his chest and pressed all of my weight onto him. His eyes were slightly open, but they were rolled back into his head so all I could see was white. He was struggling to breathe.

 


	23. Head Versus Heart

EVENTUALLY, AFTER A MINUTE or so, his seizing lessened and stopped. “It's stopped,” Clarke said. Something white and foam-like came to his lips and he coughed. “Quick, help me get him on his side. There's fluid in his lungs. Her could choke.”

Together, we lifted him and turned him onto his side. The white foam dripped out of his mouth and onto the makeshift bed. “Jesus, Clarke, he's burning up,” I said, feeling his hot cheek.

“Fluid in his lungs?” Raven cried. “Does that mean the knife... hit something?” She asked, her voice thick with tears and emotion.

“No, this isn't blood. It's something else,” Clarke shook her head, wiping the fluid from Finn's mouth. “I-I did everything she told me,” she said. Then she stopped and seemed to realise something. “Wait,” she breathed, “I've seen this before. Shortness of breath, fever, seizing,” she looked up and met Raven's eyes. “It's poison,” she realised.

“Clarke, you sterilised everything—I watched you do it!” Raven exclaimed.

Clarke shook her head and threw the cloth she was holding onto the floor. “Not everything.” She growled. She marched away from the bed and grabbed the knife from the table. “Stay here.” She barked at Raven and I, marching towards the ladder.

I raised an eyebrow. She had gotten a lot more authoritative. It wasn't the first time I had noticed that. The other delinquents listened to her—they did as she said. Most of them seemed drawn between her and Bellamy when it came to leadership. They didn't know which of them to turn to. It made sense. Both of them had what it took and though I hadn't seen much of it yet, they seemed to work well as a team. There hadn't been many people in his life that could calm Bellamy down or change his mind about something, but she convinced him to help find the radio. Her name was on a very short list.

I ignored her instructions and climbed the ladder after her knowing that just because the other delinquents listened to her, Bellamy was more likely to listen to me. She stopped when she reached the second level and I heard Octavia's voice.

“They locked the hatch.” The youngest Blake sibling said.

I climbed past Clarke and banged the hatch with my fist several times. “Bellamy!” I shouted. “It's me! Open up!” A moment passed and then something scraped across the other side of the hatch. It was opened and I immediately pulled myself through. I smoothed my hair down and fixed my angry gaze on the Grounder. I clenched my jaw. “What did you do?” I growled.

Bellamy frowned at me. “What are you talking about?” He asked.

I ignored Bellamy and marched over, grabbing the collar of the Grounder's shirt. “What did you do?” I repeated in a low, warning tone.

“Get out of my way, Miller!” I heard Clarke exclaim behind me.

I turned to see Miller with his arm across the hatch, stopping her from climbing through. “Miller!” I barked, striding over and grabbing him. I pulled him away and Clarke climbed the rest of the way up, followed by Octavia.

“What's on this?!” Clarke demanded, holding the knife in front of the Grounder's face.

“What are you _talking_ about?” Bellamy asked again.

Clarke didn't ignore him like I had. “He poisoned the blade!” She shouted. “All this time he knew Finn was going to die no matter what we did! What is it?!” She yelled. “Is there an antidote?”

“Clarke, he doesn't understand you,” Octavia defended.

“Viles,” I said suddenly. Bellamy looked at me and caught on instantly. I ran to the other side of the room and grabbed the small tin box Miller had found earlier. “It's gotta be here. You'd have to be stupid to have a poison around this long without an antidote, right?” I mused as Clarke snatched the box from me.

“Which one?” She asked the Grounder.

“Answer the question!” Bellamy shouted.

“Show us,” Octavia begged, her voice kinder than ours. “ _Please_.”

Clarke held the box closer to him. “Which one?” She asked again. “Our friend is _dying_ down there and you can stop that,” she said desperately.

Bellamy's body went tense beside me. He was getting angry and losing patience. He sniffed and wiped his nose, a sure sign of his irritation. “I'll get him to talk.” He said, stepping past Clarke and I and standing in front of the Grounder in a fighting stance.

“Bellamy, no!” Octavia exclaimed, grabbing his arm to stop him from hitting the Grounder.

Bellamy spun around so suddenly that his sister was knocked back. She stumbled, managing to catch herself. “He wants Finn to die, why can't you see that!” He roared. “Do you want him to live or not?” He asked Clarke, looking to her for the go-ahead. She didn't reply, but we could all see that she was starting to cave.

“Clarke, you said it yourself, this is not who we are!” Octavia pleaded with her. “He was protecting me, he saved my life!” She cried.

“We're talking about Finn's life, Octavia.” I said. I didn't shout, but I knew she could see that I was getting frustrated. “He is down there and he is going to die if we don't do something.” I looked at Clarke. “It's down to you, Griffin. What do you want us to do?” I asked.

There was a long pause. The silence seemed the drag on for an eternity, seeping into the very fabric that made up the world around us. It filled every part of the room and made the air feel heavy and thick. Clarke looked at each of us in turn. Bellamy and I on one side of her, Octavia on the other. Drew standing by the Grounder and Miller over at the hatch, ready to stop any more unwelcome visitors from coming in.

She was fighting between her morals and her heart. She didn't believe that taking the Grounder was right—she had made that clear. But I knew she loved Finn—I could see it in her eyes. She couldn't bear to think about losing him. She was _afraid_ to lose him. But was she willing to do _anything_ to save him?

“Do it.” She said.

Yes, she was.

“No,” Octavia whispered, the word barely audible. Tears welled in her eyes and she tried to run towards the Grounder, but Miller and Drew caught her and held her back. “Just tell us!” She shouted desperately at him.

As Bellamy went to the wall to cut away one of the seatbelts, I stood in front of the Grounder. I looked up at him and met his eyes. There was something about them that made my gut squeeze with guilt. I reminded myself why we were doing this and took one of the knives the guys had brought back from his cave from my pocket. “You brought this on yourself,” I muttered as I sliced through the material of his t-shirt with the blade.

I ducked under his arm and ripped the shirt off his back. I froze. There were marks on his left shoulder. Hundreds of tiny scars that were deliberately placed there. I almost reached out and touched them, but stopped myself and removed his shirt completely.

Bellamy was readying himself in front of the Grounder. The end of the seatbelt was wrapped around his hand and the buckle swung back and forth beside his leg. Octavia begged him to stop, but even she knew that he wouldn't. He waited until I was away from the Grounder and standing next to Clarke before he swung the belt.

The buckled smacked into his ribs, emitting a horrible cracking _thwack_. I winced at the sound, my whole body jerking involuntarily, and turned my head away. For the first time since they brought him back, the Grounder made a noise. He released a pained grunt that he couldn't hold in. It shocked me and I stood there, stunned and unable to move. Hearing him in pain; seeing that he did, in fact, _feel_ pain; reminded me that no matter how barbaric his people's methods were, he was still human and we had resorted to _torturing_ him like an animal.

But then I thought: _Are these people really so different from animals?_ They killed our people; hunted them like a wolf would hunt its prey. They lured us into traps and picked us off one by one, when all we were trying to do was find one of our people—who was kidnapped and kept prisoner by one of _theirs_. I wondered if we were really so wrong to be doing what we were doing. If you're doing the wrong thing for the right reason, is it still the wrong thing?

Bellamy whipped the Grounder again, this time across the face, and I jumped at the sound of the buckle smacking against his skin again. Clarke dropped to her knees in front of him and spread the viles out on the floor.

“Please,” she began, “which one is the antidote?” She asked.

“Just _tell_ them,” Octavia urged.

“You tell us and this'll all stop,” I said. “All you gotta do is tell us which one is the antidote.” I was growing desperate now, too. Not because I had any special bond with Finn, like Clarke and Raven did, but because I had already seen three of our people die at the hands of the Grounders in the two days I had been on the ground. I didn't want to have to add to that number.

Bellamy gently touched Clarke's shoulder. She bowed her head in despair, but moved out of his way. She joined me in the corner again, blinking away the tears in her eyes. I reached out and put my hand on her arm softly. I flashed her a reassuring smile but she knew that it was forced.

Bellamy hit the Grounder again. And then again. And again. And again. He kept hitting him until the sound of the buckle whacking his body was ringing in my ears. I started losing track of time. It could have been seconds, or minutes, or hours, or even _days_. I knew that it could only have been minutes because no one had moved other than Bellamy, but I had no way of telling. I had lost all sense of time and space and I didn't feel like I was in my own body anymore.

I was exhausted, I realised. I turned my back to Bellamy and the Grounder and went to the back of the Dropship, sitting down on one of the crates and picking up the book from where I had thrown it before. I flipped through it several times and tried to find _something_ that might tell us which vile was the antidote—if any of them. Maybe the antidote was still in his cave.

“What language is this?” I muttered to myself. There was only a small amount of writing in the book, but I couldn't make any sense of any of it.

Drew leaned over my shoulder to look at it. “I've never seen it before,” he said.

I felt my muscles tense each time the belt hit the Grounder. His groans were getting louder, piercing my head and forcing me to be aware of what was happening behind me. At least we hadn't killed him. His people didn't show John or Diggs or Roma the same courtesy. “Maybe Octavia's right,” I said, glancing over at the youngest Blake. “Maybe he really doesn't understand us.”

Drew shrugged. “Even if he doesn't speak English, he knows what we need. He's letting Finn die,” he pointed out.

I looked at Drew and realised he was right. The Grounder didn't need to speak English to understand what we were asking him for. Just like he didn't need to use words to tell us that he wasn't going to tell us anything—he didn't _want_ to.

“Enough!” Octavia screamed.

“Clarke! He's getting worse!” Raven called from the lower level.

“We're running out of time,” Clarke muttered. She returned to the floor in front of the Grounder and pointed at the viles. “Which one? Which one is it? If you tell us they'll stop!” She promised. “Please, tell us which is the antidote and they'll stop this!”

He said nothing. I clenched my jaw and slammed his book down on the crate next to me as Bellamy scrunched the belt up and threw it aside. “This isn't working.” I said coldly. “Any normal human being would've cracked by now,” I added as I stood up. I wobbled slightly, feeling dizzy, but I didn't fall.

“If that doesn't work, maybe this will.” Bellamy said, picking something up from the table by the wall. I saw the bolt as he passed me and swallowed. I knew instantly that I wasn't going to like this. “Clarke, you don't have to be here for this,” he said cautiously.

“I'm not leaving until I get that antidote.”

He grabbed the Grounder's wrist and looked at him. “Last chance.” He warned, showing him the bolt.

I turned away before Bellamy stabbed the bolt through the Grounder's hand, but I heard it. It was the most revolting thing I ever heard. It squelched and the sound was accompanied by an agonised grunt and heavy breathing. When I turned back around, the bolt was impaled all the way through his palm, blood dripping from it, and his whole arm was shaking from the pain.

As I looked at him, black spots appeared in front of my eyes and I got the sensation that I wasn't in my own body. I could no longer grasp the concept of time and everything seemed to move in slow motion around me. I thought I heard someone calling my name, but it could have been my imagination. I blinked once, and when my eyes opened again, I was falling.

Someone caught me and lowered me to the ground gently. I heard Drew's concerned voice, but he sounded like there was a layer of thick glass between us. He was asking me if I was okay.

I don't know how long it took before my hearing and my vision returned to normal. By then, Bellamy and Clarke were either side of me. Bellamy was brushing my hair out of my face and Clarke was feeling for my pulse. I shifted uncomfortably. There was something jabbing into my back.

“I'm okay,” I told them breathlessly. “I'm okay,” I repeated, more to convince myself than them.

“Renee, you're not well,” Clarke frowned. “You're hot, you're heart is _racing_.”

I shook my head and forced myself to sit up. “I'm just tired,” I argued. “I haven't slept in forty-eight hours,” I explained.

“Then go down and get some sleep.” Clarke ordered.

I shook my head again. I used Bellamy's shoulder to push myself to my feet. He stood with me, steadying me. “No,” I said. “Not until we get the antidote.” I glared at the Grounder. “I'm seeing this through.” I declared.

“What's taking so long?!” Raven shouted. Her voice sounded closer, and a second later she appeared through the hatch. “He stopped breathing,” she said.

Clarke's eyes widened. “What?!” She exclaimed, moving towards the ladder.

Raven put her arm out to stop her. “He started again,” she assured Clarke. “But next time he might not.”

“He won't tell us anything,” Clarke told her, looking over her shoulder at the Grounder.

Raven looked around the room. “Wanna bet?” She muttered, marching past the Grounder and ripping the blue wires that she had rigged to the solar panels earlier from the wall. They sizzled and sparked and the Grounder shied away, a surprised grunt escaping him.

“What are you doing?” Bellamy asked, not letting go of me. He had had his hand on my back since I stood up.

“Showing him something new.” Raven said, rubbing the two wires and making them spark some more. The Grounder backed away. For the first time, he was afraid. I could see the fear in his eyes. Raven thrust both of the wires into his chest and stomach and he writhed in pain, his muscles spasming from the electric current coursing through his body. The lights flickered on and off and she pulled them away. “Which one is it?!” She spat. “Come on!” She yelled and shocked him again. “He's all I have!” She sobbed desperately.

“No more!” Octavia shrieked.

Raven twisted around, enraged and distraught and desperate. “He's letting Finn die!” She shouted back.

Octavia held up the knife that had previously been lodged in Finn's chest. My eyes widened and the sight. “Octavia, no!” I screamed. I launched myself towards her, knocking it from her hand, but it was too late. Blood dripped down her arm from a long cut on her forearm.

“He won't let me die,” she said.

She shoved past me, pushing Bellamy out of her way when he stepped forward to help her, and knelt in front of the Grounder. She pointed at the viles one at a time, not saying anything. She went along the line, pleading with him with her eyes to tell her which one. The Grounder caved and nodded his head to the left.

Octavia picked up the vile on the end and held it up to him. He nodded his head reluctantly. She passed it to Clarke, who thanked her, and she and Raven raced down the ladder to give it to Finn.

 


	24. Poison

I WENT DOWN TO the bottom level of the Dropship to get the antidote from Clarke, for Octavia. Finn was already looked a little better and so did Clarke and Raven. The worry had faded a little from their faces but there was a tension in the room. Raven knew about Clarke and Finn. I don't know how I knew that, but I did.

I made sure that Finn was okay and asked Clarke quietly how she was doing. I couldn't really describe my relationship with her. We'd always had this... connection that I couldn't explain. Since the day Jake introduced us to each other—he was always so eager for me to meet his daughter—we had gotten on like a house on fire. We cared about each other. I guess she felt kind of like family, like a sister, because Jake was the closest thing to a dad I ever had. She told me she was okay but I knew she was lying to me. When I asked her again, she just said that we would talk about it later.

I got out of there as quickly as I could, not wanting to wither in the tension any longer than I had to. I grabbed one of the flasks of moonshine on my way to the ladder and a couple of bandages.

I found Octavia in a quiet corner of the upper level. Now that the noise from the Grounder had stopped and the storm had calmed somewhat, the delinquents were starting to doze off one by one. I had to step over their sleeping forms to get to where she sat against the wall. I almost tripped on their legs more than once before I finally made it over and sat next to her.

I gave her the antidote vile. She brought it to her lips and threw her head back, downing what was left. She grimaced at the taste of the liquid and set the vile on the floor between us. The first time that I reached for her arm, she pulled away and glared at me. “Octavia,” I said quietly. “Please. Let me help you,” I urged. “You don't have to like me, you just have to let me clean your arm.”

Reluctantly, she gave me her arm. She kept glaring. She didn't see things that way that I did and the way that her brother did. I didn't believe that she was willing to let Finn die, she only believed that there was a better way to get the antidote than torturing the Grounder. I disagreed. Mostly because I thought that he deserved the torture for more than just what he did to Finn.

I poured some of Monty's moonshine onto a rag. “This is gonna sting,” I warned before carefully dabbing the cut on Octavia's arm. She winced and hissed softly in pain. She tried to withdraw her arm, but I held her wrist. “I need to clean it,” I told her.

“I took the antidote.” She snapped angrily, glaring daggers at me.

“It could still get infected,” I explained calmly. It hurt that she was angry with me. “I get why you're pissed at me,” I said as I cleaned the injury as carefully as I could. “We were just doing what we had to do to save Finn.”

“You didn't even know Finn had been poisoned when Bellamy took the Grounder here and tied him up like an animal.” She pointed out. She was right, in a way. “When they _beat_ him to a bloody pulp.”

My eyes flickered up and met hers. “O, I know you don't want to hear this, but what Bellamy did—he did it for you. Not because you asked and not because you wanted him to, but because that Grounder up there chained you up in a cave. If you thought either of us would let that go unpunished, you were sorely mistaken.” I wrapped her arm in a bandage and stood up. “Wait here,” I said.

I climbed the ladder to the top level. Miller had fallen asleep in the corner and Drew looked like he was a few minutes away from passing out too. Bellamy was sitting with the Grounder's book, staring at the drawing of Octavia.

“Why would he draw her?” He asked as I passed him, on my way to get the bag that I had taken down with me from the Ark.

I glanced at him, then the drawing and then the Grounder. “Same reason he kidnapped her,” I said. “He's a freak.” The Grounder looked up when I spoke and met my eyes. I narrowed my own and grabbed my bag, swinging one of the straps over my shoulder. I cocked my head to the side and examined the man. He looked around Bellamy and I's age, maybe a couple years older. “Y'know, sometimes he has this look in his eyes like he actually understands what we're saying,” I remarked.

Bellamy looked over. “Maybe he's just pretending,” he suggested. “Maybe he does actually speak English.”

I shrugged my shoulders and headed back to the hatch. “Whether he does or he doesn't, we need to figure out what we're gonna do with him,” I asserted. “We can't keep him tied up in here forever.”

I left without a reply, going back down the Octavia. She looked at me disparagingly as I approached, still angry with me. She looked briefly at the bag I was carrying. “What's that?” She asked.

“I took it down with me from the Ark,” I explained, sitting back down beside her. I opened the zip and rummaged around inside. My hand searching through the bundles of clothes and tools until I felt the familiar leather binding of Bellamy's book. I pulled it out and placed it in Octavia's lap. “I found it a few days after you guys were sent down. I took it to give it back to him but... well, y'know.”

Octavia lifted it from her lap, holding it as though she was afraid it would turn to dust if she wasn't gentle enough. “I remember this,” she whispered. “Mom used to read it to me. Bellamy taught me to read with this book. I knew most of it off by heart by then anyway, I'd heard it so many times.”

I tapped the cover of the book with my finger. “This is who we were on the Ark—kids who could sit down together and read a book. But here, on the ground, things have to be different. _We_ have to be different. We can't sit around and read to each other. We can't live in peace,” I told her. “Believe me, I wish we could go back to those days before you were locked up, but we can't reverse time. We have to make do with the lives we have now. And hating each other, being angry with each other, is not going to help us survive in this place.”

Octavia looked at me, her green eyes oddly sad. “Then why do you hate Bellamy?” She asked.

I smiled, a little amused. “Because I'm angry with him,” I replied. Octavia released a small laugh and hugged the book to her chest. Reminding her of her childhood seemed to have worked and she didn't look angry anymore. “You should get some rest,” I told her. “I'm gonna check on Bellamy and then do the same.”

I pushed myself to my feet and instantly regretted it. Black spots danced in front of my eyes and my head felt like it was floating away from the rest of my body. I wobbled and almost fell over, but Octavia jumped to her feet and steadied me. “Ren?” She said worriedly. “You don't look so good.”

I shook my head and patted her shoulder. “I'm okay,” I told her even though I was struggling to keep my eyes open. “I'm good. Just stood up too quickly is all.” I took one step away from her, towards the ladder, and my legs buckled. I crashed onto the floor. It should have hurt, I thought, but I didn't feel it. I heard Octavia screaming Clarke's name over and over. I heard annoyed shouts from the other delinquents who were woken by her screaming. I felt her hand on my arm and saw her drop to her knees next to me right before my eyes slipped shut.

I felt liked I did when I was on a spacewalk for a moment. Weightless, floating. Then it was like I was falling. It was like one of those dreams and when you wake up, you feel like you've just fallen onto your bed when it's really just every muscle in your body spasming. That's what it felt like. A dream. The world didn't feel real. And then it wasn't, and all that existed around me was blackness.

 

 

I wasn't sure if I was really I wake. I had dreamt that I'd woken up three times by that point. Every time, Bellamy was by my side. I hoped that when I woke up for real, he was there.

I was vaguely aware of something cold and wet touching my forehead intermittently. That hadn't happened in the last three dreams. This time, when I pried my eyes open and blinked against the light in the Dropship, it was Octavia that was leaning over me. She was moping my brow with a wet rag, I realised.

“Clarke!” She exclaimed as soon as she saw that my eyes were open.

A moment later, Clarke's face came into my line of vision too. “How do you feel?” She asked cautiously. She took my wrist gently and felt my pulse.

How did I feel? I had to think about it. “I feel...” I croaked. “My head hurts. Actually, everything hurts,” I said. I was disorientated and couldn't seem to get my bearings. “It's really warm in here,” I commented. “Can someone turn the heating down?” It was only when the words were already out in the open that I realised how stupid they were. I had forgotten for a moment where we were.

“That's the fever, Renee,” Clarke told me patiently. “The cut on your arm—you were poisoned too,” she explained.

I squeezed my eyes shut because the light was hurting them. “There's no more antidote,” I whispered. “I gave the last of it to Octavia.”

“We know,” Clarke said softly. She stroked my hair soothingly. I moved to sit up but groaned when my head started pounding even harder. The two girls gently pushed me back down. “Don't try to sit up,” Clarke told me. “You hit your head pretty hard.”

“What happened?” I groaned.

“You collapsed... You started seizing, just like Finn,” Octavia said. “I didn't know what to do,” her voice cracked and I took her hand squeezing. “I was really worried, Renee,” she whispered. “I thought you were going to die. You were just... shaking and you wouldn't stop and then you started choking.”

“It's okay; I'm okay,” I smiled weakly at her. I turned my head to the side and looked around the room. I was on the bottom level of the Dropship. Finn was still on his make-shift bed on the other side of the room to the one that they had put me on and Raven was beside him, asleep with her head next to his arm. “Where's Bellamy?” I asked. Octavia and Clarke exchanged a worried glance. I looked between them, growing concerned. “Guys. Where's Bellamy?” I asked again.

Octavia sighed deeply and shut her eyes for a second. “He's gone,” she said before opening them and looking at me. “He went back to the Grounder's cave to find more of the antidote.”

 


	25. Antidote

I TRIED TO SIT up, rambling incoherently about Bellamy. Clarke and Octavia were holding me on the bed.

“Renee!” Octavia shouted over me.

It was only then that I realised how loud I was being. I was yelling at them both. I had to go after Bellamy. It wasn't safe out there, between the Grounders and the storm. And what if he got to the cave and there were other Grounders there, looking for the one that we took. They would kill him.

Miller came down the ladder then. He rushed over when he saw me struggling against the two girls, begging them to let me up so I could go after Bellamy. “Hey, Renee, it's okay!” Miller said, grabbing my arms. “Bellamy's fine!” I quietened down and let him speak. “Drew went with him. He'll be fine. He's not alone out there,” he told me.

“Drew went with him?” I repeated.

Miller nodded. “Yeah. As soon as Bellamy told us where he was going, Drew insisted on going too,” he explained.

“Good,” I whispered. I was glad that someone else cared enough about that idiot not to let him do stupid things on his own. “H-how long have they been gone?” I asked.

“Less than an hour,” Miller replied. “They'll be a while yet. It's a trek and a half through those woods in the wind and the rain, I can tell you that,” he said. He smiled. It was the first time I had seen him smile, though I hadn't known him long. It was such a warm expression and it filled me with so much hope that I physically relaxed and lay back on the makeshift bed. “They're gonna be just fine, I promise you. You need to get some rest,” he told me.

“I don't think I can sleep now,” I muttered, but even as I said it I could feel my eyes getting heavy. “Who's with the Grounder?” I asked.

“I left Monroe up there,” he answered.

I nodded a little, regretting it when it felt like my brain was sloshing around inside my skull. “You should go back up,” I said. I chuckled when Miller looked at the ladder reluctantly. “I promise not to go after Bellamy,” I added.

Miller looked back at me and chuckled too. “Get some rest,” he told me again, squeezing my hand before heading back up to watch over the Grounder.

I wavered in and out of consciousness for some time after that. I didn't know how much time passed between when I fell asleep and woke up each time. It was hard to get any proper rest between my thumbing headache and burning body. I felt sick too.

Sometimes when I woke, Octavia was there. Others it was Clarke. There were a couple times that I was alone, but I could hear voices nearby and I knew it was them. They were always close. I didn't think either of them left the room the whole time. Clarke woke me for a few seconds at one point to give me water. She told me I had to stay hydrated and I drank greedily from the cup she placed at my lips.

I dreamed too. I dreamed I was back on the Ark. All the people that I cared about were there. It was the strangest dream because nothing happened. No one said anything. We all just stood in a circle in the mess hall on Go-Sci, which had been cleared of tables and chairs. My mother was there, and Aurora too. Octavia and Bellamy stood either side of me. The Griffins were there—Jake included. And standing across from me in the circle was a man without a face.

Where his face should have been there was only skin. He had no hair and he wore plain clothes. I knew who he was. I had seen him in my dreams before. He was my dad. A featureless figure that should have been in a nightmare, but instead appeared in some of my happiest dreams. I didn't know who my dad was or what he looked like, so I replaced him with this unrecognisable humanoid shape.

The next time I gained consciousness after the strangely peaceful dream, I woke properly and sat bolt upright. I started coughing so much that there was no time to breathe. Each cough was violent and shook my entire body. Clarke and Octavia rushed over to me, both telling me to breathe, but I couldn't. I couldn't breathe. Suddenly, I hunched over and my stomach twisted and I threw up over the side of the bed.

I fell back on the bed once I had finished vomiting, breathing heavily and drenched in sweat. Octavia moped my brow with the wet rag and tried to get me to speak to her, but my throat was to dry. I tried asking for water, but no sound came out.

Luckily, Clarke caught on and fetched me a cup. I grabbed it as she held it to my lips and drank the whole contents of the large cup. “How do you feel?” She asked me once she had set the cup on the ledge next to us.

“Shit,” I muttered weakly.

Octavia looked up at Clarke. “She's not getting better,” she said.

Clarke touched my forehead and my cheeks and my neck. Her already frowning face morphed with concern. She looked so like her mother. There was a loud bang on the outside of the Dropship that made all three of us jump. It came again and was followed by a voice this time.

“Clarke!” Bellamy shouted over the howling wind and the lashing rain. “Clarke! Open the door!”

Octavia jumped up from beside me and ran to the lever, pulling it without hesitation. The ramp lowered and Bellamy and Drew were running up it before it even touched the ground. The former held up a small vile. “We got it,” he panted. He looked at me and his eyes widened when he saw that I was awake. “Renee,” he breathed. He sprinted across the Dropship as the door was closed behind him and cupped my face in his large hands. “Oh my god, Renee,” he whispered. He pressed his forehead to mine and we both shut our eyes, enjoying the moment of intimacy and forgetting that there were others there with us.

“Bell, the antidote,” Octavia reminded him.

He pulled away from me suddenly and opened the vile. He tenderly cupped the back of my head and lifted it so that I could drink from the vile. The liquid inside was disgusting, but he encouraged me to drink all of it. He only took it away from my lips once it was all gone.

Before he could say anything more, I wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled myself up into him. I buried my face in the crook of his neck. He wrapped one arm around my waist and grabbed the back of my neck with his other hand.

“You fucking idiot,” I muttered into him. “Don't ever do that again.”

“What?” He asked in amusement. “Save your life?”

I let go of him and looked him in the eye. “Risk _yours_ to save mine.” I corrected seriously. “I can't lose you, Bellamy. Not again.”

Bellamy pulled me into another hug, this one tighter and more desperate than the last. We hugged each other like it was the last time we would ever see each other. “I'm not going anywhere,” he whispered quiet enough that only I heard him.

 

 

Clarke stayed annoyingly close to me as I shuffled down the ramp and into the camp. I looked over at her. “Clarke, really,” I said. “I'm okay now. You don't have to follow me everywhere I go. Go to Finn. You should be there when he wakes up,” I told her.

She was reluctant, but I could tell she wanted to. “You're sure you're okay?” She asked.

I nodded my head. “Yes, I'm fine,” I said again. “Besides, there are loads of people here that can help me if I really need it,” I pointed out, indicating all the delinquents that were cleaning up the camp. It was a mess after the storm. Trees had come down, sections of the wall were missing, the tents had been flattened. “ _Go_ ,” I urged, pointing back up the ramp.

She looked me over one last time before turning on her heel and retreating back into the Dropship. It felt good to be outside again, breathing fresh air into my lungs. It helped to clear my head, which still hurt. Octavia said that when I collapsed I hit my head off one of the seats, so I was stuck with a mild concussion. Clarke thought that my headache had been made worse by hypoxia—in other words, my brain didn't get enough oxygen when I was seizing.

I was still pretty weak from the poison, but I didn't want Clarke, or anyone else for that matter, babying me all day. I wanted to be outside. And I also wanted to wash. I reaked.

“We'll get it cleaned up,” Bellamy said, appearing next to me. He held something out to me. “Yours, I believe,” he muttered.

I took the gun from him and put it back in my waistband. I looked around at the carnage. “I wish this was our only mess,” I said.

Bellamy looked down at me and frowned. “You don't think we should have taken him?” He asked.

“No, I think you did the right thing going back for him,” I told him. We walked across the camp together.

Bellamy raised his eyebrows briefly. “I'm surprised.”

I frowned. “By what?” I asked.

“You. Agreeing with me,” he responded. “Honestly, I thought you'd be totally against all this. Like Octavia.”

I breathed deeply. “The way I see it, we have just as much right to be here as they do. Just because they were here first doesn't mean they own the whole damn planet,” I said. “We landed here. That means that this is our home now too, whether they like it or not. And I don't know about the rest of these people, but I'm willing to fight to keep my home.”

Bellamy looked down at me in wonder. “You never cease to amaze me, Renee Olson,” he mumbled.

“The question now is; what are we gonna do with him?” I mused, looking towards the Dropship. “We can't keep him locked in there forever,” I pointed out.

“If we let him go, he'll be back and not alone next time,” Bellamy said.

I nodded my head slowly and looked down. “I know,” I agreed.

“Hey,” Bellamy touched my hand and I looked back up at him. “Who we are, and who we _need_ to be to survive, are two very different things,” he told me.

There was a long silence between us. Eventually, I pulled my hand out of his and forced a small smile. “I'm going to the river to get washed up,” I told him.

Bellamy frowned concernedly. “Are you sure you're up to it?” He asked. “You still look pretty weak, and you've not eaten since—”

“I'm okay now,” I assured him. “I just wanna get cleaned up after... everything.”

“Do you know the way?”

“I think so,” I nodded. “Through the woods and past the tall tree, right?” I joked. He laughed quietly. “But yes, I'm pretty sure I know the way,” I confirmed. We smiled at each other a little awkwardly and I started towards the gate. I was halfway there when I stopped and turned around. “Hey, Bellamy!” I called. He looked up. “It actually might be helpful to have someone who knows the terrain. You free?”

 


	26. The Waterfall

BELLAMY LED ME IN a slightly different direction to the one we had all come in from the river after finding the radio. I didn't question him and I was glad because when we came through the trees and joined the river, I saw the most beautiful thing that had ever graced the earth.

The white water cascaded down on a series of rocky outcrops, giving the effect of many waterfalls rather than just one. It was about ten meters tall and sparkled in the sunlight. The pool at the bottom was serene. A plume of water vapour hung over the plunge pool.

The noise of water hitting water was almost deafening. Nothing could be heard over it. I had stopped at the treeline to stare in awe at the magnificent sight. I was brought back to reality when Bellamy put his palm flat on my back and urged me to walk forward.

“This is beautiful!” I shouted over the sound of the waterfall.

Bellamy leaned down and placed his ear next to mouth. “What?” He shouted.

“It's beautiful!” I said again.

He nodded in agreement and grinned. He lead me a little downstream where the noise wasn't so deafening and we sat down on the rocks. They were warm from the sun already. I lay down, putting my head in his lap, and shut my eyes, letting the sun warm my face.

“Remember when we used to talk about the ground?” I said. I opened my eyes to watch him nod, squinting against the sun. “I didn't think it would be like this,” I admitted.

“Neither did I,” he agreed. He wound a strand of my hair around his finger. “I didn't even think half these colours existed,” he joked. “It's not what I expected at all. And not just because of the Grounders.”

I fiddled with my fingers and gazed up at the blue sky. “That was probably the biggest shock coming down, though,” I said. It was a lie. The biggest shock coming down was finding out what Bellamy had done. “I expected to arrive on a planet inhabited only by juvenile delinquents and you. But I get here and... there are survivors. Survivors that want to kill us.”

“It's like you said,” Bellamy began, “this is our home now too,” he echoed. “And there's no way we're going anywhere. I'm tired of running away from things.”

I nodded my head slowly but didn't speak. My skin felt horrible. I had never felt so dirty in my entire life and I just wanted to get clean. So I stood up and started unbuttoning my jeans.

Bellamy's eyes widened. “Renee, what the hell are you doing?” He asked cautiously.

I looked down at him and flashed him a toothy grin. I pushed my jeans down my legs and stepped out of them. “I'm doing what I came to do,” I told him. I grabbed his hand and pulled him onto his feet. “Take off your damn clothes, Bellamy Blake,” I joked, removing my jacket and pulling my tank top over my head. It took my hat with it and I dropped both items into the pile of clothes, leaving me in only my underwear.

Bellamy was still getting undressed as I hobbled over the spikey rock in my bare feet and jumped down onto the water. It came up to my knees and the feeling of it surrounding my legs was incredible. It was refreshingly cold, a harsh contrast against the burning fever I'd had overnight. I waded upstream to the waterfall and let it wash over me like a shower. I washed my hair and my body as best I could without soap or shampoo.

I stood under the torrents of water and let them massage my scalp, watching in great amusement as Bellamy hopped across the rocks, wincing as they jabbed the soles of his feet. Even though he looked stupid, jumping around like that, I still couldn't help but admire him. He was only wearing his boxers. He was a lot fitter than I ever realise and I was pretty sure that he had gained more muscle since being on the ground. His thighs, his abdomen, his chest. I felt like a stupid teenager.

He reached the edge and was about to crouch and slide into the pool, but he slipped on the wet stone and toppled into the water with a great splash. I laughed hard and loud. I laughed more than I had in a long time. I half swam, half waded back over to him as he stood up, wiping the water from his eyes and shaking his head, causing droplets of water to fly everywhere.

“You're an idiot,” I teased.

“Yeah, well, we're not all as graceful as you, Olson,” he grumbled, splashing water at me.

I snorted and splashed him back. “Me? Graceful?” I repeated. “Are you high, Bellamy?” I asked.

Bellamy chuckled. “Man, I wish,” he said. “There's nothing to get high _on_ down here,” he complained.

“I'm sure there's something. I'll find something and get you high soon enough, don't worry,” I said. I moved my arms through the cool water and smiled at the pleasant feeling. “I wish I could swim,” I muttered. I started wading out until the water came up to my neck and then looked back at Bellamy. “This feels so good!” I called to him.

I took a deep breath, pinched my nose and ducked under the surface. I floated motionless under the water for a few seconds and then opened my eyes. I couldn't see anything and the water stung my eyes awfully. I got my feet back under me and stood up, gasping for air as soon as I broke the surface.

I went to speak to Bellamy, but I couldn't see him anywhere. My smile fell instantly and I looked all around me. “Bellamy?” I called. When I didn't get a reply, I started to panic. “Bellamy?!” I screamed, my voice echoing through the woods. Something clamped around my ankle and I screamed, springing away. Bellamy surfaced beside me, pissing himself laughing. I glared at him and shoved his chest. “Asshole.” I growled, but after a few seconds, I joined in his laughter.

I took a step and lost my balance on the uneven riverbed. I grabbed Bellamy's arm but he fell with me and we fell under the water. He wrapped his arms around my waist and brought us both back up to the surface, keeping me close as we both laughed at our own stupidity.

“Don't do that again,” I said through my laughter.

“Why?” He asked. “Were you _scared_?” He teased.

“Yes.” I replied bluntly. “I was _scared_ that you'd left me, Bellamy.”

He stopped laughing and frowned. “Renee, I would never do that,” he said softly.

I looked away. “But you _did_ , Bellamy. You _did_ leave me,” I pointed out. “I get why but... I'm trying to be okay with it, I really am. I want to forget it all, I just...”

Bellamy's arms unwound from my waist and he held my face in both hands. “I'm sorry,” he whispered. “Renee, I've never been more sorry for anything in my life. I was being selfish—I _know_ that. But you have no idea how much I hated myself for what I was doing. I don't expect you to forgive me. Hell, I know I don't deserve forgiveness for any of the things that I've done. I've screwed up so many times, but you're always there,” he said. “I don't deserve you...” He touched his forehead to mine and I closed my eyes.

“Why did you do it?” I asked quietly. I was afraid to speak any louder because I didn't trust my voice.

“Because I'm a selfish, spineless coward,” he replied. “And because I was scared. And because I'm an asshole. And because I always throw the best things in my life away. Because I'm a fucking _idiot_.”

There was a long pause. “You're right about one thing,” I said and felt him tense slightly. “You _are_ a fucking idiot.”

He chuckled and pulled me closer. “I meant it, you know?” He said. “I know I haven't done a great job of showing you, but I _do_ love you, Renee.”

I squeezed my eyes shut tighter and tried not to cry. “I...” I trailed off and had to start again. “I love you too,” I whispered shakily. I felt Bellamy move and I knew what he was going to do. I turned my head to the side just before his lips touched mine and took a step away from him. “I can't,” I murmured, not knowing what else to say.

I moved away from him and went back to the waterfall, leaving him standing there. I stood with my back to him, but after a while, I snuck a look over my shoulder. He had made it back to the shore by then and was pulling his trousers back up. I grabbed his t-shirt and his jacket and walked back to the trees with them in his hand, his hair and back still wet.

I did still love him. I loved him so much that it physically hurt me to watch him walk away like that, knowing that things could be different—better. But I still felt betrayed and hurt and I wasn't ready to forgive him for that yet, no matter how much I wanted to run after him and throw myself into his arms again. He was the only one that I ever wanted to talk to about these things, but now it was _about_ him.

 


	27. Dax

WE FOUND AN OLD computer monitor in the bunker that Raven and Clarke got the new transmitter from the same day that Bellamy and I went to the waterfall. Clarke had urged me not to leave camp again, already unhappy that I'd gone as far as the river, but I insisted. I didn't tell her, but I wanted to be as far from Bellamy as I could get so that we didn't have to go through some awkward encounter in front of everyone. We would talk about it eventually.

Two days had passed, however, and Bellamy and I still hadn't said a word to each other. I had seen him on the other side of the camp a few times, but quickly turned and walked the other way. I didn't trust myself not to cave and kiss him like I so badly wanted to. I was still angry at him and I hadn't forgiven him. It wouldn't be fair to give him hope that maybe I had when I just _hadn't_. So I stayed away.

Clarke and I sat in the radio tent two days after the storm ended and we re-established communication with the Ark. The screen was split into seven squares. There was one large one in the middle and a vertical line of three on either side. Jaha's face was shown on the largest and tile and the faces of the six other Council members were shown on the others. The ancient screen flickered on and off every so often and the image was distorted.

Jaha introduced us to the newest member of the Council. He explained that after helping Raven and I break the law, Abby's seat was taken away from her. The long gray hair and sharp, angular facial features of the woman that had taken her place were familiar to me.

“This is Diana Sydney,” Chancellor Jaha told us. “I'm sure you remember her.”

I did remember Diana. Very well, in fact. She was Chancellor before Jaha was. It had been almost eight years since she was elected into the position but I remembered the day very clearly. She was the first Chancellor from Factory Station and the whole station was celebrating for days after she won the election. Me and Bellamy joined in the celebrations with everyone else. We drank a lot of moonshine and put in a lot of late nights, even though we were only fifteen at the time.

Diana looked at our faces on the screen on their end and smiled. The smile didn't seem the reach her pale eyes. “Hello,” she said. “It's nice to see you again, Renee. I'm glad you're safe,” she added.

We had only met a couple of times during the four years that she was Chancellor. On Factory Station, everyone knew everyone. She lived near me before she moved into the Chancellor's quarters on Alpha Station, which Jaha now occupied, so we were familiar with each other. “You too, Diana,” I replied politely.

“Tell us how life has been on the ground so far,” he said and I focused back on his tile.

I scratched the spot beside my eyes and glanced through the gap in the tent flaps. The camp was still pretty busy. The delinquents buzzed around outside, going about their daily jobs. I was surprised at first how they all came together. The day after the storm was the first time I had really seen them working around camp. There was a group out hunting while others helped to rebuild the sections of the wall that came down in the storm or sorted through all the food.

“Raven and I have done what we can since we got here, with the help of Monty Green and a few others,” I told the Council. It was strange to sit there and talk to them like we were the same. “We rigged the solar cells on the Dropship to power the lights and the radio, but we're still in need of a lot of electrical supplies that you guys will have to bring down if we want life on the ground to be remotely like it was before.”

Jaha nodded slowly as I spoke, taking in what I was saying. “The Grounder. Tell me about him,” he continued. “Can he provide any insight on how to survive the winter?” He asked.

Clarke and I exchanged a look, our eyebrows raised at each other in a knowing way. “Well, he hasn't given us insight on anything so far,” I replied.

“We're doing everything we can to prepare here. We're gathering nuts and berries, curing meats, digging for roots, but the truth is... we'll freeze before we starve,” Clarke told them.

I nodded my head in agreement. “It's getting colder every day,” I said.

Kane spoke next. When I looked at his tile, the same anger that I always felt when I saw him flooded in. “There's good news on that front,” he told us, looking down at the tablet in his hands. “According to civil defence plans from before the war, there's an old emergency aid depot not far from the landing site,” he held the tablet up to the camera to show us. “Here are the coordinates,” he said.

I managed to make out the numbers on the nuclear screen and jotted them down.

“In addition to supplies, it could provide shelter for the Hundred and for the citizens coming down from the Ark,” Jaha said.

“And what makes you think it's intact?” Clarke asked.

I nodded my head once when I finished writing down the coordinates. “Yeah, it's been almost a hundred years. It's probably collapsed by now,” I agreed with Clarke.

“It was designed to withstand nuclear warfare,” Kane replied.

I shrugged and leaned back in my seat. “All right,” I said, “it's worth a short.”

“Chancellor, I have to object,” said Diana Sydney. “Project Exodus is underway. The kids should sit tight in their camp until the first Dropship launches.”

“Even if everything goes without a hitch, the Hundred would die from exposure before relief arrives,” Jaha contradicted. “I'd like a moment with Clarke alone, please, and I know there's a line of parents waiting to talk to their kids.”

The other Council members stood up and left the room. I removed the headset and patted Clarke's shoulder silently. We both knew what Jaha wanted to talk to her about—her mother. She had been refusing to speak to Abby after finding out that she was the one who turned her father in. I hadn't spoken to Abby either. Jake was important to me, too.

I pushed the tent flaps aside and stepped out into the cold air. My breath crystalised in a mist in front of my face. I scraped some ice off one of the seats outside the tent and sat down, pulling my knees up to my chest to hold in as much heat as I could. The four nights had spent on the ground had been cold, but this was the first morning we had woken up to find ice outside.

“Morning, Renee,” Drew called sleepily, coming towards me from the direction of the toilet trench. “How are you doing?” He asked.

“Good,” I replied. “You?”

Drew shrugged. He picked up a stick and used it to scrape away the ice on the seat next to me, then collapsed into it. “Waiting to speak to your mom?” He asked, jabbing his thumbing over his shoulder at the radio tent behind us.

I nodded. “Yeah,” I said. “What about you?” I asked. “Anyone waiting on you?”

Drew looked away and shook his head sadly. “Both my parents are dead. Dad was floated when I was a kid and my mom got sick a couple years ago,” he told me. He looked down at his hands. “That's why I took it off,” he said out of the blue. “My wristband,” he added a moment later. “I took mine off because they locked me up for trying to save my mother.”

“I'm sorry,” I whispered. “About your mom and dad.”

He shrugged. “I didn't tell you so you could feel sorry for me,” he said. “So what about your dad? Why isn't he waiting to speak to you?”

I sighed. “I dunno who he is,” I said. “I don't even know if he knows I exist,” I told Drew.

“That's too bad,” Drew said. “I didn't know my old man all that well,” he offered.

I liked talking to Drew, I realised. He just seemed to get it. Most of my life, I had been made to feel ashamed that I had no idea who my father was. But on the ground, we were all on the same level. There were no more stations dividing us. There was no social hierarchy. There was still authority, but it wasn't the same as it was on the Ark. The Hundred were being led by one of their own.

I never felt like I belonged on the Ark. Home had never been a place for me, it had always been people. My mother. Bellamy. Octavia. Aurora. Even, to a certain extent, Roman. Even if I never felt as strongly about him as he did about me, he kept me grounded and tamed the rage that I always held inside me. The ground felt like home. The camp felt like home. I was finally home and I was with people who were just like me. Okay, I was never arrested and I was never caught for the minor crimes I had comitted—or the slightly more serious one of stealing a gun—but I was surrounded by people who thought just like I did and felt the same way that I did.

“None of that matters anymore,” I said to Drew. “Everything up there, everything we did and everything we said and everything that happened to us, it doesn't matter down here. This isn't just a second chance, it's a fresh start. A clean slate. All of you will be pardoned when the Ark comes down. Bellamy will... Well, we'll figure something out for him. But when they come down, they're gonna have to rely on you, just like I've had to. You know this place, the rest of us don't.”

Drew grinned. “I like the sound of that. The Council, the Guard, all the people who put us down, coming to us for help,” he said. “Yeah. Yeah, I definitely like the sound of that.”

“Renee,” Clarke said behind us, coming out of the radio tent. “Your mom's waiting.”

I stood up and brushed some water off my jeans. “See you around,” I waved to Drew.

“See you. Good luck,” he called back.

I caught Clarke's arm on my way into the tent. “Are you gonna talk to your mom?” I asked her in a hushed voice.

Clarke shook her head. “No.” She answered firmly.

I sighed and let go of her. “Can you do me a favour?” I asked, continuing after she nodded her head. “Can you find Bellamy and Octavia and tell them to come to the radio?”

“Yeah, sure,” Clarke agreed.

We went in opposite directions. She went towards the Dropship and I slipped inside the radio tent. I stopped on the other side of the tent flaps and stared at the pixelated screen. Adaline looked nervous. She couldn't see me yet, but I could see her. It was such a relief, even though it had only been a few days. I shuffled over and sat down, slipping one of the headsets on.

“Hey, mom,” I croaked.

My mother covered her mouth and her face filled with joy. “Oh, baby, I'm so glad you're okay,” she said. “I heard you. The other day, when you managed to contact the Ark, your signal was broadcast over the Ark-wide network. I heard your voice and I—” Her voice broke and tears slipped down her cheeks. “God, I've been so worried, Renee. I know it's only been a few days but I've been so worried, baby.”

I smiled and shut my eyes to keep my own tears from escaping. “It's so good to hear your voice,” I said softly.

“You look well,” Adaline commented. “A bit beaten up, but well. What happened to your head?” She asked.

I instinctively reached up, remembering the cut left at my hairline from the landing. “Rough landing,” I told her. “Raven and I were both knocked out. We woke up and Clarke was there. It was raining,” I grinned. “My god, mom, it's amazing down here. You're gonna love it.”

“How is everyone?” Adaline asked. “Clarke and Raven? Bellamy and Octavia?”

I hesitated. It was better not to tell her about Octavia getting kidnapped or Bellamy's attempts to make sure the Ark didn't come down. She was so happy that I was okay and hadn't died getting to the ground. I didn't want to ruin that by making her worry about us. “They're good,” I said at last. “They're all good. Clarke is being Clarke. She's helping everyone, they all listen to her. Raven's as cocky as ever,” I joked. “She's happy to be back with Finn. Bellamy and Octavia miss you. So do I.”

As if on cue, the tent flaps rustled and the Blake siblings entered. Bellamy came first, Octavia following. Smiles took over both their faces when they saw Adaline on the screen. Octavia sat down next to me and Bellamy stood behind us. I handed him the second headset and held the one I had been using between Octavia and I so we could both hear Adaline.

“Octavia,” she breathed. “Oh my god, look at you. You look so like your mother,” she said, her lips spreading into a delighted smile. “How are you both?” She asked.

“We're good,” Octavia answered happily. She was putting on an act, just like I was. We were all pretending that everything was fine so as not to worry Adaline. “It's been difficult, but we've managed,” she continued, glancing at me for a brief second and then back at the screen. “Having Renee here has made it easier. I'm not stuck on my own with this idiot anymore,” she joked, pointing over her shoulder at Bellamy. I could tell that there was a trace of honesty in what she said.

“And you, Bell? How are you?” Adaline urged.

Bellamy pause and I felt him tense behind me. “I'm good,” he said. “I... I...” He trailed off.

Adaline narrowed her eyes. “What is it? What aren't you telling me?” She demanded.

Bellamy took a deep breath. “I've been an idiot,” he admitted. I looked at him, but he didn't look at me. “But I'm gonna make things right. I'm working on making amends.”

My mom smiled. “I'm sure you will,” she said and I couldn't help feel guilty for sitting there and lying to her, saying that everything was fine when it was so far from fine.

Kane walked into view behind Adaline and cleared his throat, getting her attention. She looked back and even on the unclear screen I could see her tense at the sight of him. “Time's up,” he said. “Say goodbye.”

Adaline turned around and smiled reluctantly. “I love you guys, okay? I'll talk to you soon, I promise,” she said. “Stay safe. And look after each other.”

I smiled back at her and nodded. “We will,” I promised. “Bye, mom.”

“Bye, baby.” She smiled one last time and then stood up, brushing past Kane and leaving the room. As soon as she was gone, Bellamy took off his headset and put it down. I glanced at his back as he retreated out of the tent, eager to escape Kane's gaze. Octavia touched my shoulder gently and got up and left too, leaving me alone to talk with the Vice Chancellor.

Kane sat down in front of the camera and I cleared my throat, putting Octavia and I's headset on my head properly. “Who's next?” I asked, getting ready to write down the name.

“Actually,” Kane began slowly. “There's someone else to see you,” he told me.

I lifted my head and frowned. Who on earth could be asking to see me? My mother was the only person I had left on the Ark. Unless... my mind went back to what she told me about my father. That he was alive and on the Ark. Maybe she had gone to him and told him where I was. My hopes shot up and I nodded to Kane. He stood up again and disappeared off the side of the screen. I heard muffled voices through the crackling headphones that were linked to the screen. Then a figure came in front of the camera, still standing up so that I couldn't see his face. He wore a guard's uniform and there was something very familiar.

When he sat down, I realised why. This wasn't my father. The man that now sat on the other end of the video call was a ghost of his former self—of the man that I knew on the Ark. Suddenly, all the anger I had felt towards him because of the last time that we talking disappeared and was replaced with unimaginable guilt. Roman's skin was almost grey and there were dark circles around his eyes. His hair was a tangled, greasy mess and his beard had grown out. His usually proud, broad shoulders had fallen forwards in exhaustion and the light in his eyes were gone.

“Roman?” I whispered, though I wasn't even convinced it was him. At least, he wasn't the Roman that I knew. There was a cut, surrounded by a dark bruise, on his left cheekbone and another scrape on his chin. His lip was burst and swollen. “Rome, what the hell happened to you?” I gasped, my hand flying up to cover my mouth.

Roman shook his head, fixing me with a cold, bitter stare. Even on the flickering, pixelated monitor, I could see the anger in his eyes. “Don't act like you care,” he said, his voice gruffer than I had ever heard it before. It scared me a little to see someone that I knew so well and yet not be able to recognise them. “You _left_ me, Renee. You left me for _him_.” he spat. “You could've at least told me, you know? Instead of lying to me. I would have understood if you had just _told_ me. But you were too much of a fucking coward to do that, weren't you, Renee?”

Tears stung my eyes. Because he was right. I wished that he was wrong so that I could say he was just being an asshole, but that wasn't the case at all. “I didn't know how to tell you,” I replied, surprised that I had even been able to find my voice. He was right. I was a coward.

“Just tell me that it meant _something_ to you and dating me wasn't just to cover up how you felt about him,” Roman said weakly.

“Of course it meant something!” I exclaimed. “Roman, I do love you. Just... not in the way you want me to.”

Roman looked down and the pain on his face made my heart break. “You used me, Renee,” he said. “You have no idea how much I love you. Even after everything, I _still_ love you and it's killing me. Because you're down there and you're with him.”

I shook my head. “I'm not with him, Roman,” I said. “The whole time he's been down here, Bellamy has been trying to stop Clarke and the others from contacting the Ark. He forced people to take off their wristbands, he stole my radio and trashed it. So don't worry, I got what I deserved. I never meant to hurt you, Roman, but you should know by now that that's what happens to people who get too close to me. They get hurt.”

Roman took a minute to process the information. “I want to hate you, you know?” he said at last. “I want to hate you. Everyone is telling me that I should hate you. But I don't. Dammit, Renee, I miss you. You have no idea how relieved I was when I heard your voice on the radio. I thought you were dead for sure,” he sighed and his shoulder sagged even more. “I should hate you so much, but I love you.”

“I'm sorry, Roman,” I whispered, a single tear sliding down my cheek. “I'm so, so sorry.”

Roman's chair scraped along the floor and he got ready to stand up. “It's a bit late to start saying sorry now, Renee. I just wish you'd been honest with me,” he said. He stood up and a second later he was gone.

I barely had time to compose myself before Kane was back. I blinked rapidly to get rid of the tears in my eyes. “Okay. Who's up next?” I asked.

Kane looked down at the desk in front of him. “Dax Michaels,” he read out.

I copied the name down and stood up. I left the radio tent without another word. I spotted Bellamy standing alone outside the Dropship, sharpening the end of one of the makeshift spears. I wasn't sure how to act. I didn't like the feeling of uncertainty. Everything with Bellamy had always been so sure and I knew where I stood with him. But now, I wasn't really sure where _he_ stood with _me_.

“Bellamy,” I said, announcing my presence to him. He looked at me but didn't respond. I itched the corner of my eye nervously. “Bellamy, you need to talk to Jaha,” I told him.

He suddenly flipped the spear around and stabbed the sharp end into the damp ground. He twisted around and shook his head angrily. “No.” He grumbled. “Absolutely not.”

I glared at him and grabbed his arm when he tried to walk away, forcing him to stand in front of me until I had finished. “Then what are you gonna do?” I asked. “The Ark _is_ coming down. And when it does, you'll have to answer for your crimes.”

Something inside Bellamy snapped and he gave me a hard stare that made me was to cower away in fear. “And what about _you_ , Renee? Are you gonna answer for your crimes? Or is it okay that you committed treason, stole a gun and god knows what else, because you were doing it for the right reasons?”

I shook my head. “You're unbelievable, Blake.” I spat. “I heard you in there, okay? You wanna make up for the shit you've done?” I scoffed. “Start acting like it. So far, I've not seen you make much of an effort to 'make amends'.”

I marched away from him. Every time I thought there was the slightest possibility that I could find a way to forgive him and for things to go back to the way they were, he said or did something that reminded me what a selfish asshole he really was. I felt like an idiot. I was friends with him my whole life and I never realised what he was really like.

I picked my way through the camp, calling Dax's name. I had no idea who he was. Five minutes later, I was starting to wonder if he was even in the camp. Clarke had made up a list of all the people we had lost and his name wasn't on it. She and Miller (he went to the radio tent in Bellamy's place) had spent the morning talking to the parents of the dead delinquents and telling them what became of their children. Maybe he was out with the hunting group.

I stopped at the nut-sorting station where Jasper and Monty were throwing nuts into the air and catching them with their mouths. “Have you guys seen Dax?” I asked.

“Over there,” Monty replied, pointing behind me. “On the meat crew.”

“Thanks,” I muttered. I went over to where a group of delinquents were curing the meat that had already been stripped from the animals the hunters brought back. “Dax?” I said.

A tall kid with sandy hair and a long face looked up. “Yeah?” I grunted, looking me up and down as if wondering what I could possibly want from him.

“You're up,” I said, nodding back towards the radio tent and ignoring the look he gave me. He nodded quickly and dropped the piece of meat he had been holding. Once he was gone, I headed towards the Dropship to check on the Grounder. I knew Miller was up there with him. Drew was probably there too, and Bellamy. I reached the bottom of the ramp and stopped suddenly. “Dammit.” I cursed.

I turned on my heel and walked back to the radio tent. The coordinates that Kane had given us for the depot were still in there. I figured it was best that we left as soon as possible to avoid being out too long after dark. I pushed the tent flaps apart and ducked in, opening my mouth to apologise for interrupting, but the words that came out of Dax's mouth shut me up.

“I'll do it,” he said. “I'll kill Bellamy Blake.”

My mouth fell open and I gasped audibly. Dax's head snapped towards me and his eyes went wide. I glanced from him to the screen. Commander Shumway's face took up the picture. His mouth was moving but I couldn't hear what he was saying. Dax and I stared at each other, neither of us moving.

I had no idea what I just walked into, but I knew that I had to warn Bellamy. I had to _do_ something. I took a step backwards. It seemed to snap Dax back to reality. He sprung up and lunged forward, holding his hand out towards me. Before he reached me, I grabbed the gun from my waistband and pointed it at him. He stopped, shocked, and took a step back.

“I won't let you hurt him.” I said.

Dax looked from me to the gun and back again. “You won't do it,” he claimed. “You won't pull the trigger.”

I clenched my teeth. “Try me!” I snarled at him. I pulled the hammer back and the bullet clicked into place. He took a step forward, but I jerked the gun. “Don't move.” I spat. “Don't _fucking_ move or I'll put this bullet right between your eyes.” I glared at him. “Go on, see if I'm bluffing!” I was proud of myself for staying in control so far.

He sprung up and lunged at me. He grabbed me, knocking my gun from my hand. It fell somewhere out of sight. I swung blindly at him with a clenched fist and struck his jaw. His head snapped to the side and his teeth knocked together loudly. I tried to run away but he pulled me against him, holding me there with his arm across my collarbones, and covered my mouth and nose with his other hand, stopping me from screaming out for help.

I pleaded with him to me go. My words were inaudible through his palm. He pressed tighter on the bottom half of my face, cutting off my air. I continued to struggle, but he was bigger and stronger than me. Black clouds floated across my vision. I began to feel lightheaded and I knew I was going to pass out. My eyes rolled into the back of my head and my knees gave out.

 


	28. Pointed Gun

I WOKE WITH A start and immediately scrambled clumsily to my feet, looking around me in a panic. It took me a minute or two to orientate myself and get my bearings. I was somewhere deep in the woods. I couldn't see the delinquents' camp, nor could I hear it. I had discovered in my short time on the ground that the laughter and shouts of the teenagers could be heard for half a mile around the camp.

I didn't recognise the part of the woods I was in. I hadn't had much time to explore and learn the terrain, but I was sure that I had never been there before. What happened with Dax started coming back to me. He must have taken me out here after I passed out so that no one would find me. I had to get back to camp and warn Bellamy, if it wasn't already too late. Despite being so angry with him, I couldn't bear the thought of losing him.

I had no idea which direction the camp was in. I looked around for tracks left behind by Dax that might point me in the right direction but I found none. I turned around on a circle, trying to think of some way to find my way back home. I thought back to all of my Earth Skills classes, trying to remember the pieces of information that I had gleaned when Bellamy and I weren't messing around, ignoring Pike. I could recall one useful piece of information—the moss on the trees grew predominantly on the North side of the trees.

I knew for the countless maps of the area that I had studied over the past two days that the river was North of the dropship and flowed relatively straight from West to East for several miles. I doubted that Dax had taken me across the river; my clothes were dry. All I had to do was keep walking North until I reached the river and then follow it upstream to the waterfall. I knew my way back to the dropship from there.

I alternated between running and walking towards the river. If I ran for too long, it hurt my knee. I found that out the hard way when we were looking for Octavia. I spent a long time after the accident thinking that I would be back to normal after just a few months. But it had been two years and it still wasn't normal. Before I broke my knee, I would have been able to run through these woods no bother. But not now. Not now that it caused me excruciating pain after just five or six minutes of running.

I suppose the uneven ground didn't help. I was constantly having to swerve around trees and jump over rocks and fallen tree trunks and branches. Earth certainly wasn't what I had expected. When Raven and I were preparing to come down, we were both thinking about reuniting with the people that we cared about and not the dangers we might face after that happened.

I walked and ran for almost half an hour before I heard the sound of running water. I spotted the white waters through the trees and started to veer off, joining to the river and jogging alongside it. It only took another few minutes before I reached the waterfall. I wished I could stay and go in the water. Part of me wished I could go back to the day that Bellamy took me there. I wished that I had just let him kiss me because then maybe things wouldn't be this way. Maybe he would have gone with me back to the tent and heard Dax too, then neither of us would be in this mess.

Relief like I had never felt it washed over me when I spotted the wall around the camp. I broke into a run and pushed the gate open. A few heads turned towards me but no one said anything. I didn't stop to talk to anyone and focused on scanning the camp for Dax. I couldn't see him anywhere.

I went around to the other side of the dropship where the meat crew were working. He wasn't there either. “Have any of you seen Dax?” I asked them.

The boy that was taking the meat from the bench where they were removing the skin and fur to the smokehouse looked over at me. “He left about half an hour ago,” he replied. “Said he needed to clear his head and get the stench of dead animals out of his nose. Can't say a blame him.”

I swallowed and I felt the colour drain from my face. “He's gone?” I asked, my voice weaker than I meant it to be.

The boy nodded. “Yeah. I'll tell him you were looking for him when he comes back,” he offered.

I clenched my jaw. “He won't be coming back if I have anything to do with it.” I snarled. I turned on my heel and went back to the dropship. I was limping badly as I made my way up the ramp. The pain in my knee was increasing. I had to pray that Bellamy was in there, watching over the Grounder and trying to get some intel from him.

Octavia was on the bottom level, sitting with her back against the ladder. She smiled and pulled herself to her feet when I came through the curtain over the doorway. “There you are,” she said. “Bellamy and Clarke were looking for you.”

Dread filled my gut. “Where are they?” I asked shakily.

“They went to the depot that Kane told them about,” she answered. “They think we might be able to stay there over the winter. It should be big enough to hold us all until the Ark comes down.”

I ran my hand over my head, which was covered by my hat. “O, I need a map.” I told her.

The urgency in my voice filled her with worry. I saw it seep into her eyes. “Uh, Clarke has some on the upper level. But Miller and Drew are up there—they're not letting anyone up,” she said. “My brother's orders.”

I grabbed the rungs of the ladder and started to climb. “I won't give them a choice,” I mumbled. “Go to the radio tent. Get the piece of paper to the coordinates on it. It should be right in front of the screen,” I called back down to her.

“On it!” She called.

I passed the middle level and threw open the hatch at the top of the ladder. Miller stepped up to me as I climbed through. “Get out of my way.” I ordered.

He didn't move. “Bellamy told us not to let _anyone_ up here.” Miller replied.

I rolled my eyes. “We both know he wasn't talking about me.” I bit back. “Now get out of my way,” I repeated.

Miller reached out to stop me, but Drew grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back. “Let her up, Miller,” he said. “It's _Renee—_ Bellamy won't care.”

“I'm not even here for him,” I added, nodding at the Grounder who was still tied up in the corner where he had been for the past three days as I walked across the room. “I just need a map.”

I opened up some of the boxes that were piled at the back of the dropship. I found a stack of rolled up maps in one of them. I rifled through them until I found the one that covered the area of North America that we were in and strode back over to the hatch. I gave Drew a quick nod of thanks before climbing back down the ladder with the map tucked under my arm.

Octavia was coming through the parachute as I reached the bottom. “I got it,” she announced, handing me the piece of scrap paper that I had written the coordinates on earlier. Spreading the map out on the table that the radio had been on before we moved it into its own tent, we both leaned over it. “Ren, what's going on?” Octavia asked me.

I looked at her. I didn't know what to tell her. I didn't want to tell her what Dax was planning, but I also didn't want to lie to her. “Bellamy's in danger,” I finally said. “And I have to help him. Before it's too late.”

Octavia didn't say any more. After ten minutes of hard work, we found the spot on the map where the depot should be and figured out the easiest route to get there. Octavia filled me in on some of the terrain, warning me to stay away from the ridge which was surrounded by marshland.

“At least take someone else with you. I get it; you want me to stay here and stay safe, but what about _you_ , Renee,” Octavia tried to persuade me. “Take Miller or Drew. Or Monroe, Harder, _anyone_. Just please don't go out there alone. What if you get lost? What if—”

“O, I'll be fine, trust me. I'm not putting anyone else at risk,” I interjected. I was filling my backpack with a few rations and some water to last me to the depot. I reached for a small pouch of nuts but Octavia grabbed my wrist and shook her head.

“Don't eat those,” she warned. “They're making people hallucinate.”

I smiled thankfully and instead took a pouch of berries and zipped up my bag. “Don't come looking for us if we don't come back, Octavia,” I said, gripping her shoulder and looking into her eyes. “Do you understand? I need you to promise me.”

Octavia shook her head. “I won't make a promise to you that I know I can't keep.” She said.

I smiled and chuckled softly, hugging her tightly. “I love you, Octavia. Remember that,” I whispered.

“Love you too, Ren,” she replied. “Just... bring my brother back safely. And get yourself back here too. I don't wanna lose either of you.” Octavia pulled away and reached behind her. “I found this in the radio tent, under the table,” she said, producing my gun. “I'm guessing it's yours?”

I nodded and took it from her, tucking it safely into my waistband where I had been keeping it since I got to the ground. “Thanks,” I said. “I'll see you soon, okay?”

“Promise?” Octavia muttered.

I nodded. “Promise.”

 

 

I lost track of how long I had been searching the area for the entrance to the underground depot. It had gotten dark and light rain was sprinkling all around me, making the ground wet and slippery. I was picked my way down a small slope when I lost my footing. I fell on my back and slid the rest of the way down.

I groaned and sat up, wiping the mud from my hands on my jeans and cursing under my breath. I got to my feet carefully, afraid that I would fall again. I didn't have any time to waste. I had taken my gun out of my waistband when I was still in the trees and now gripped it firmly in my hand. If I found Dax before I found Bellamy, I had to be ready. In the tent, when he accused me of bluffing, he was right. I wasn't going to shoot him. But if the only way to save Bellamy was to end Dax's life, I would do it. Without hesitation. There was nothing that I wouldn't do for Bellamy.

I slithered a few metres along the bottom of the slope before stopping in my tracks. Through the darkness, I could just make out something sticking up from the ground. I moved a little closer and breathed a sigh of relief. It was the depot door. I ran over, almost falling more than once, and climbed inside.

The stairs descended for several metres into the ground. The bunker was dark. I swung my bag off my shoulder and rummaged around for the flashlight that I had taken from the dropship. I found it and turned it on, shining it around me. There were thick cobwebs in the corner and the railings on the stairs were covered too. On the wall across from me was written EMERGENCY AID DEPOT #23 in bold, white letters. If this was number twenty-three, I thought, there must be others somewhere.

Looking around, I could already tell that we couldn't live down there. The place was freezing cold and water had leaked through the hatch. There was an inch of water on the floor of the passage at the bottom of the stairs. “Bellamy?” I called, my voice bouncing off the walls and coming back to me. “Clarke?” I tried, but neither of them replied. I took a deep breath and delved deeper into the dark bunker with my gun pointed out in front of me. “Bellamy? Clarke?” I called again as I moved through the narrow passages.

The passages lead me to another set of stairs, shorter than the last. I picked my way down them, careful not to touch the cobwebs on the railings. My foot hit something that was sitting on one of the steps and I immediately swung my gun down and pointing the flashlight at it. I was shocked by what I saw. There was a skeleton sitting there. The flesh had rotted completely off the bones and the clothes were starting to wither and decay too. I small shriek shot out of my mouth before I could stop it and I stumbled away from the body, covering my mouth.

I practically fell down the last few steps and ran down the passage to get away from the skeleton. I slowed to a walk once I could no longer see the stairs and took a few deep breaths. I called Bellamy and Clarke's names again but still got no response. They couldn't have gone _that_ deep into the bunker. There was no point. The Hundred couldn't live down here and any supplies would either be gone, taken by the Grounders or someone else, or too old to be any use anymore.

I turned a corner into another passageway and saw the soft glow of light at the other end. “Bellamy?” I shouted. “Clarke? Are you there?” I asked. Silence. I jogged along the passage and came to a large cavern at the end of it. I looked around. There were glowsticks placed around the room and two flashlights sat on top of a stack of boxes. Then I spotted her. Her blonde hair lay across her face and her eyes were closed. “Clarke,” I breathed. I lowered my gun and ran over to her, falling to my knees next to her. “Clarke, can you hear me?” I said softly.

I brushed her hair out of her face and tapped her cheek. She didn't even flinch. I put my hand under her head to lift her up and sit her against the wall. When I took my hand away, it was stained red with blood. I frowned, worry seeping into my brain. I tilted her head forward and saw the blood soaked into her hair. I felt her wrist for a pulse and was relieved when I felt the thumping in her vein.

I gripped my gun tighter and looked over my shoulder, checking the room. Dax was here somewhere. He was probably looking for Bellamy. I looked back at Clarke, tucking a few strands of her hair behind her ear. I got up and went over to the boxes where her and Bellamy's flashlights sat. Their bags were nearby, along with two half-empty pouches of the same nuts that Octavia said were making people hallucinate. The lid had been taken off one of the boxes and inside were piled of orange blankets.

I grabbed one of the blankets to use as a pillow for her and in the process, knocked Bellamy's bag onto the floor, uncovering something that I didn't think I would see until the Ark came down. A rifle. I picked it up. It was loaded. “Guess we hit the jackpot here, huh, Griffin?” I muttered.

I put the gun back and bent down to pick up Bellamy's bag. I was surprised by how heavy it was. I set it down and opened it, peering inside. There was a lot of food inside, more than he needed for a simple trip to the depot and back to camp.

I shook it off and took the blanket over to Clarke. I rolled it up and carefully lowered her down so that he head was on it. “I'll come back for you, Clarke, I promise,” I whispered. I kissed her forehead quickly before turning and running back the way I came. “Bellamy?!” I screamed desperately.

I ran up the smaller staircase, past the skeleton, and along the passageways to the exit. It was raining heavily now and I was soaking before I even got out of the hatch. Night had fallen and the whole area was covered by a blanket of darkness. I yelled Bellamy's name again as I ran across the slippery ground, looking everywhere for some sign of him or Dax.

A shout drifted through the air and I turned towards it. It was Bellamy—I knew it was him—and he sounded afraid. I broke into a run towards him and skidded to a halt when I reached the treeline. Bellamy was on the ground, his hand raised like he was holding a gun, and Dax stood over him with one of the rifles.

“Put it down, Dax!” I shouted, aiming my gun at his head and trying my best not to let on that I had never actually fired one before.

He spun around and now I was the one staring down the barrel of his rifle. “I thought I killed you.” He said gruffly.

“Next time,” I growled, “check for a pulse before you dump someone in the woods.”

Dax swallowed and I saw him move his finger over the trigger. “Shumway said no witnesses,” he said.

I frowned. “Why does Shumway want Bellamy dead?” I demanded.

It wasn't Dax who answered. “Shumway set it up,” Bellamy told me from the ground. “He's the one who gave me the gun to shoot the Chancellor and helped me get on the dropship. He's the one who wanted Jaha dead.”

“Quiet!” Dax growled at him. “Walk away now, Renee, and I won't kill you.”

I shook my head. “And what makes you think you can kill me, kid?” I retorted. “I'm not going anywhere, so why don't you put your gun down and _I_ won't kill _you_.”

Before I could do anything, Dax pulled the trigger. Bellamy yelled and launched towards him as I dived behind a tree for cover, the bullets narrowly missing me. I heard a faint thud as the two of them hit the ground. I aimed my gun around the tree, but they were moving around too much. I couldn't try to kill Dax without risking shooting Bellamy.

“Stop!” I screamed as Dax roughly pushed Bellamy onto the ground and started punching him. I fired two shots but both missed. My hands were shaking too much and I had no experience.

Dax managed to get his rifle from the ground and was pressing it against Bellamy's jugular, choking him. I pulled the trigger a third time, with the barrel aimed at Dax's head, but it jammed. I looked at it for a split second before throwing it aside and charging at Dax. He swung around, hitting my shoulder with the butt of his gun. I stumbled, but didn't lose my balance, so he hit me again, this time in my knee. My bad knee. I screamed in pain and fell on the ground, my head reeling as white-hot pain seared through my knee.

A moment later, Dax was on top of me. He punched me again and again and I there was nothing I could do to stop him. He wrapped his hands around my throat and started squeezing, pressing all of his weight down onto me. Just as dark clouds started to float in front of my eyes and I thought I was going to pass out for sure, he has wrenched away from me. I coughed and spluttered and rolled onto my side.

Bellamy had Dax in a choke hold. I watched with wide eyes as the man that I had known all my life stabbed an empty bullet case into the teenager's neck. Blood spilt out, drowning Dax where he stood. He slumped and Bellamy let him fall onto the ground. I watched his eyes closed and his chest rise and fall for the last time. He was dead.

 


	29. Broken Pieces of a Broken Soul

BELLAMY WAS BESIDE ME before my mind could really catch up with what had just happened. Tears welled in my eyes as I looked at Dax's lifeless body. Bellamy gently grabbed my shoulders and helped me to sit up. His hands cupped my cheeks and he looked into my eyes. His lips were mouthing, but I couldn't hear what he was saying over the thundering in my ears.

He helped me scrambled over to the nearest tree and we both sat against it. I reached for his arm, gripping it tightly, and he placed his hand over mine and slouched against me. “You're okay,” I whispered, resting my forehead against his shoulder and squeezing my eyes shut as tears slipped down my cheeks.

Bellamy shook his head. “No, I'm not,” he said shakily. “My mother...” he trailed off. His voice was thick with emotion. “If she knew what I've done... who I am.” He couldn't meet my eyes. “She raised me to be better. To be _good_.”

“Bell, you _are_ good,” I breathed, desperate for him to understand.

“All I ever do is _hurt_ people,” he continued, finally turned to face me and I saw more guilt in his eyes than any normal person would be able to carry. “I'm a monster.” He whispered.

“No.” I snapped. I put my hand on his cheek and forced him to look me in the eye. “You are _not_ a monster. You saved my life today, Bellamy. And it wasn't the first time and I doubt it'll be the last.”

Bellamy's eyes grew glassy. “I can't stay here, Renee,” he said.

I frowned. “No,” I whispered weakly. “No, you can't leave me, Bellamy, I _need_ you. I've always needed you,” I said desperately. “Octavia needs you, too, and Clarke and everyone back at camp. None of them would've survived down here without you, Bell.” I took his hand in mine and laced our fingers together. “You want forgiveness, fine. I'll give it to you. You're forgiven, okay? _I_ forgive you. But you can't run. You have to come back with me. You have to talk to Jaha and face what you did. It's the only way.”

Bellamy shook his head. “They will kill me as soon as they come down here, Ren, and you know it.”

“I won't let them!” I exclaimed. “Look, forget Jaha. Forget what you did. Think about Octavia. She needs you, whether she knows it or not. And I need you. Without you, I know I won't last five minutes down here. I can't bear to be without you again, Bell. Please. Come back with me.”

“Come with me,” Bellamy blurted out.

“Bellamy, _no_!” I snarled. “Neither of us are going anywhere.” I told him firmly. I grabbed his face and moved closer to him. “You need to stop running away. That's not who you are, Bell. I know you. Running isn't gonna make up for the things you've done, but staying will. Everything you've done since Shumway put that gun in your hand was for your sister, I can't fault you for that. So think about her now. Don't leave me to go back there and tell her that her brother is gone and that she's never gonna see you again.”

I didn't think, I just closed the distance between us. I kissed him and the world fell away. It took him a moment or two to comprehend what was happening and kiss me back, but once he did it was slow and soft, comforting in ways that words would never be. For the first time since I found out what Bellamy had done, I didn't hate him. There was no part of me that hated him or was angry with him. I loved him with all my heart and, for just a moment, I wished that we could run away together. I wished that we could live away from the problems of our people and not have to deal with the issues he had brought upon himself.

I realised then why I cared about Bellamy so much. It wasn't because he was always there for me or because I knew him better than I knew myself. It wasn't because he was my best friend or because I was in love with him. It was because, in the end, I knew that he would always do the right thing. No one is perfect. Everyone screws up. I committed treason up on the Ark. I hurt Roman. I abandoned him and my mother. I was as flawed as any other person and that was okay. So I couldn't fault Bellamy for his flaws—not anymore.

Bellamy Blake could be a complete asshole. He could take a beautiful place and turn it into the burning pits of Hell. He could turn peace into mayhem with just a few words. But he could also inspire people to do great things with those same words. He could turn fire into beauty and mayhem into peace. The delinquents back at the dropship respected him, and so did I. In the end, everything Bellamy had done since he was six years old was to protect Octavia, it had just taken me some time to see the honour in that. He was doing the wrong things for the right reasons.

We broke apart, breathing heavily, but stayed close. I closed my eyes and pressed my forehead against his. I had never felt closer to him. It felt like every part of us was connected—not just our bodies but our minds, our hearts, our souls.

“Okay,” Bellamy whispered, the word barely audible.

I opened my eyes and looked into the dark circles in front of them. They held a light I had never seen in them before. “What?” I whispered back.

“I'll talk to Jaha.”

 


	30. Militia

IT TOOK ME LONGER than I cared to admit to remember that Clarke was still down in the bunker, injured and unconscious. I had been so caught up in the moment between me and Bellamy that every other thought was pushed to the back of my mind. As soon as I remembered, I ran straight to the bunker but Bellamy stayed above ground to burry Dax's body.

Clarke was exactly where I left her and didn't look as though she had moved a muscle. I fetched her bag from beside Bellamy's and rifled through it until I found her first aid kit—as limited as it was. I cleaned the cut on the back of her head as best I could. It was deep and had already stopped bleeding, so I didn't bother putting a bandage on it.

She stirred and emitted a quiet groan as I was packing her stuff back into her bag. I turned to her immediately, brushing her hair back as she opened her eyes. “Renee?” She mumbled, seemingly having difficulty focusing on me. “What... What happened? Where's Bellamy?” She asked.

“He's... dealing with something outside. He won't be long,” I told her. “How do you feel?”

Clarke frowned. “My head hurts,” she said. “Something hit me. I didn't see what.”

I hesitated before deciding to tell her the truth. “It was Dax. He knocked you out,” I explained.

“Why would Dax...” she trailed off and focused on something behind me. I turned to see Bellamy standing in front of the passageway that led to the exit. “Are you okay?” She asked, seeing the blood on his face.

Bellamy nodded and came over to join us. “I'm fine,” he assured her.

“What happened?” Clarke asked again, looking between the two of us.

I glanced at Bellamy. “Everything's been sorted out,” I said, smiling at him. I turned back to Clarke and helped her sit up. “Shumway sent Dax to kill Bellamy. He tried to kill me too because I overheard him in the radio tent. But it's over—he's dead now.”

“Why would Shumway—”

“To shut me up. He gave me the gun to kill the Chancellor,” Bellamy filled her in.

“It gets better, Clarke,” I grinned at her. “Bellamy's going to speak to Jaha. He's going to explain everything,” I told her. “All you have to do is offer him a deal. He pardons Bellamy and in return, Bell tells him who gave him the gun and helped him get on the dropship. It's all gonna work out.” Even as I said it, I wasn't sure that I one hundred percent believe it yet.

 

 

After Clarke recovered enough to stand, we gathered our things. We used some rope from one of the boxes to tie the rifles that Clarke and Bellamy found together, making them easier to carry. We filled as many bags as we could carry between the three of us with ammo and blankets and, after doing one last sweep of the bunker, we left.

It was almost morning when we arrived back at camp. The horizon had a light faze to it as the sun got closer to rising. Something felt off. Bellamy and Clarke seemed oblivious to it, but I felt it. It was something I could never explain. My mother called it a sixth-sense and said that I got it from her. It was the same feeling that told me that Bellamy and Octavia were alive on the ground when I was still on the Ark, and it was the same feeling that told me now that my mother was okay.

The chatter as we got closer to the gate sounded nervous. I noticed before the other two that there was no one guarding the main gate. As soon as I alerted them, we sped up our pace a little. My knee ached terribly as we did. It had been throbbing ever since Dax hit it, but Clarke assured me that it wasn't broken again. I didn't really need her to tell me that. I could still remember the pain of breaking it like it happened yesterday, and this felt nothing like that. Mind, the accident didn't just break the joint, it _crushed_ it. I hoped that I would never feel anything like it ever again.

Bellamy pushed the gate open and let Clarke and I go first. Everyone was milling around the centre of the camp, around the fires and the dropships, and had completely abandoned their posts. Then we heard a shout that spread a blanket of silence across the delinquents. Miller had come running out of the dropship with something between anger and panic on his face and in his eyes.

“He's gone!” the boy shouted. “The Grounder's gone!”

Clarke and I both looked at Bellamy, eyes wide in worry. He simply shook his head and adjusted the guns that hung over his shoulders. “It doesn't matter. Not anymore.” He told us firmly.

I nodded after a beat. “He's right,” I agreed, glancing at Clarke. “We can defend ourselves now.”

“What if he brings other Grounders back?” Jasper said shakily.

“He'll kill us all,” another delinquent pointed out.

“Or _worse_ ,” a second added. Both of their voices held us much fear as Jasper's did. I could feel the fear of the delinquents as they gathered in a tighter group, sharing their concerns.

“Let the Grounders come!” Bellamy called as we reached the group. The delinquents parted to let us through and we stood next to the fire, looking around at them all. “We've been afraid of them for far too long, and why?” He said, quirking an eyebrow. “Because of their knives and spears. I don't know about you,” he paused and looked around. “But I'm tired of being afraid.”

Bellamy looked to his left at Clarke and I and nodded. The three of us swung the stacks of guns that we carried over our shoulder and dropped them in a pile. Murmurs rose around us and people cheered softly, amazed and relieved at the sight of the weapons.

“These are weapons, okay, not toys,” Clarke told them. “And we have to be prepared to give them up to the Guard when the dropships come,” she pointed out. “But until then, they're gonna help keep us safe.”

“And there are plenty more where these came from,” Bellamy added. “Tomorrow, we start training. And if the Grounders come, we're gonna be ready to fight.”

I smirked and folded my arms across my chest. I looked at Bellamy and Clarke either side of me. “Let's kick some Grounder ass and show them what we're really made of.”

“Hell yeah,” Miller called. He was standing across from us, at the front of the crowd. A few others agreed too and the chatter started up again across the camp.

As the crowd thinned and Clarke wondered away, I turned to Bellamy. “Jasper was right, Bell,” I said quietly. “The Grounder will be back. Even with these guns, there's still more of them.”

“Hey,” Bellamy smiled reassuringly. It was a smile that I had missed. He reached for my hands and held them gently in his. “We can do this. Them up there,” he nodded towards the sky—towards the Ark, “they think we're weak. But we're not. Maybe when we came down here, some of us were. But not anymore.”

I sighed and looked down. I let myself fall forward a little and leaned my head on his chest. “I hope you're right,” I said. Taking a deep breath, I let go of him and took a step back. “We should put these in the dropship and think carefully about who we give them to,” I said, kicking the guns with my foot.

“And how do we do that?” Bellamy asked. We picked the rifles up from the ground and started to carry them towards the dropship.

I looked over at him as we climbed the ramp. “You've been here longer than I have. Who do you trust?” I asked. “Whose hands can you put one of these guns in and know that they won't turn around and shoot you instead of the Grounders?”

“Miller,” Bellamy replied instantly. “I trust him.” He paused. “And Drew, too,” he added. He looked at me, a strange look in his eye. “Keep them close... if anything happens to me.”

I glared at him. “Nothing is gonna happen to you.” I snapped. I climbed the ladder ahead of him. I didn't want to think about what might happen to Bellamy. There was a war coming and we both knew it. I just couldn't bear the thought of him getting hurt.

I dropped the guns near the hatch. The space where the Grounder had been tied up felt almost haunted. The emptiness of the room only fueled the worry in my gut. I went over and inspected the ropes that once kept him our prisoner. They had been cut clean through. It was deliberate and done with a sharp blade. I frowned, realising that someone helped him. Someone let him go. I felt Bellamy come up behind me and looked at him.

“He didn't escape, did he?” He said.

I shook my head. “Someone freed him,” I confirmed. I turned away from the cut ropes and took the two bags I was carrying off my back. Bellamy did the same and we emptied them in silence. More than once my eyes flickered to Bellamy. There was something bothering him and I knew what it was. I took one of the orange fleece blankets from my bag and held it out to him. “Go find her,” I ordered. “You sister needs you right now.”

Bellamy smiled gratefully and took the blanket from me. He didn't leave immediately but instead pulled me into a hug, pressing his face into my shoulder. When he pulled away, his gaze dropped to my lips and he hesitated. I closed the distance between us for him and kissed him quickly. He muttered a soft 'thank you' and left, leaving me to finish unpacking the supplies alone.

I decided that I was going to gather a few people and go back to the bunker tomorrow. There were still a lot of supplies down there that we could use. Bellamy, Clarke and I hadn't been able to carry them all back ourselves. I would ask people that Bellamy and Clarke trusted. It was best that not everyone in the camp knew where the bunker was. There were, after all, criminals. I was admittedly surprised at how far they had come since arriving on the ground. But I couldn't forget why they were here.

I had always been critical of the way that things were run on the Ark, but I was starting to see that they were right about some things. Not everyone could be trusted. It didn't make sense to give all the information to everyone. If everyone knew about the location of the bunker, for example, then it wouldn't be difficult for the Grounders to find out either—if they didn't already know it was there.

I left the dropship once the bags were empty with an armful of blankets. I handed them out around the camp, making sure that the people who weren't sleeping in tents near to the fires had one and explaining to others that there would be more soon—after I returned to the bunker and took the rest. Until then, they would have to make do with what they had, like they had been doing for the last two and a half weeks.

After I handed off the last blanket, I headed to the fire. I heard Clarke calling Bellamy's name. It took me a minute to find him, but eventually found him standing near the wall with Octavia, who was now wrapped in an orange blanket. He met my eyes across the camp and I nodded once, hoping that it was reassuring even though, really, I was just as nervous as he was. If the Chancellor refused to pardon him, he would have no choice but to go. Despite everything I said after he killed Dax, I knew that I would go with him. At least now I would be able to say goodbye to Raven and Clarke and persuade Octavia to come too.

Bellamy started walking towards the radio tent but stopped when he was halfway there and looked back at Octavia. “That Grounder escaping,” he said, “was that you?”

“I had nothing to do with it,” Octavia replied. She paused before speaking again, softer this time. “Thanks for the blanket.”

Bellamy smiled at her, even though she wasn't looking at him, and went with Clarke into the radio tent. I sat on a log by the fire, my knee bouncing up and down and my eyes fixed on the radio tent. I had no idea how long I sat there before I was joined by Raven. She sat next to me.

“You good?” She asked, staring into the flames.

I nodded. “I'm good.” I said. “You?”

She also nodded. “I'm good.” We were both lying and both of us knew it. “You and Bellamy seem better,” she commented.

“Yeah,” I murmured. “I think... I think we've finally sorted everything out. Maybe now, things can go back to the way they were. Or as close as they can get down here,” I couldn't help but smile a little. “You and Finn? How are you?” I asked carefully. I didn't want to say anything unless she already knew. I still firmly believed that Finn should be the one to tell her about what happened between him and Clarke.

Tears welled up in Raven's eyes and I knew then that she knew. “He slept with Clarke,” she whispered weakly. “Did you know?” She asked me.

I nodded slowly. “Clarke is sort of like a sister to me,” I explained. “So, yeah, I knew. I didn't tell you because you deserved to hear it from him. But I promise you, Raven, that if he didn't tell you I was going to.”

Raven looked down at her hands, the corners of her mouth turning downwards. “Finn didn't tell me,” she admitted. “I figured it out myself. He didn't even have the courage to say it to me myself.”

“Raven, I—” Just then, the flaps of the radio tent moved apart and Bellamy came out. I looked between him and Raven, biting my lip.

Raven smiled and nodded. “Go. I'm okay,” she said. “I've faced worse than this before.”

“Raven—”

“Renee, for the love of god, _go_ ,” she insisted.

I placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder before I stood up and made my way towards Bellamy. We reached each other, and at first, he said nothing. My heart sunk and I prepared myself for the worst. Then, a grin lit up his face. “Jaha pardoned me. They're arresting Commander Shumway as we speak,” he told me.

I threw myself into his arms and he lifted me off my feet, spinning me around as we both laughed, utterly relieved. He set me down and kissed me. I ran my fingers through his hair and looked into his dark eyes. “Everything's really going to be okay,” I whispered.

 


	31. Unity Day

IT WAS UNITY DAY and the atmosphere in the camp had changed drastically. Most of the delinquents had forgotten about the threat of the Grounders that was looming over us. They were so wrapped up in the idea of a party that all their common sense and proper judgement had gone out the window. Jasper and Monty were somewhere in the camp, brewing up a batch of moonshine especially for the Unity Day celebrations that had migrated from the Ark to the ground.

I had gathered with Raven and a number of the delinquents to listen to the Chancellor speak. Raven and I had rolled the front of the radio tent up and fastened it with some miscellaneous wire we found in the dropship. On the Ark, everyone swarmed to the Gathering Place on Go-Sci for the Chancellor's Unity Day speech. I had missed the ceremony only once when I was thirteen. I came down with influenza and was quarantined in medical for two weeks.

Watching it from the ground was surreal. The reality of my situation really sunk in as I stared at the screen, standing between Raven and Miller. I was on the ground. I was _home_. Since Raven and I landed on the ground, we had been surrounded by chaos and we had been doing our best to help to control that chaos. I had spent that last two days since the events at the emergency depot going in and out of camp, foraging and hunting. We built a smokehouse for curing meats and we brought boxes from the depot to keep our food in. I had barely slept thinking about the Grounders just waiting to attack us.

Unity Day was the first time we had been relaxed and it paved the way for the euphoria of being on earth to set in and consume us.

“ _My friends,_ ” Jaha began, “ _this is a historic Unity Day. Every year, we mark the moment our ancestors of the twelve stations joined to form the Ark, but this is the last time we do so while aboard her. Next year, on the ground._ ” Those listening up on the Ark applauded that; they applauded their Chancellor and the notion that, in a year's time, they would be settled happily on Earth's soil.

“Right. After _we_ did all the work,” Miller scoffed, indicating himself and the rest of us around him. “Someone shut him up.”

“You shut up, Miller. No one's forcing you to watch,” Raven retorted.

I raised an eyebrow, surprised to hear her defending Chancellor Jaha. “He has a point,” I said. “Besides, Jaha's talking our his ass. This whole 'Unity Day' thing is a joke,” I claimed.

“What makes you say that?” Raven asked.

“'Cause the Ark only came together after the thirteenth station was blown out of the sky. They just don't like to talk about it because that would mean admitting that our history isn't all sunshine and daisies,” I replied. “And I guarantee, when they get down here, they won't wanna talk about the fact they sent a hundred kids down to die. Because that shows the council and the Chancellor in a bad light and we can't have that.”

Raven snorted quietly. “You sound like Finn,” she said, a little bitterly, and wandered away from the radio tent.

“ _For ninety-seven years, we have eked out an existence, hoping that someday out descendants would return to Earth,_ ” the Chancellor continued.

The speech was interrupted on our end by a loud shout from across the camp. I turned around along with the others stand watching in time to see Jasper emerging from a tent on the small rise in the centre of the camp, followed by a cloud of steam. He straightened up, brandishing a large cauldron over his head. “Monty strikes again!” He shouted. He moved his goggles to the top of his head and ran down the slope into the throng of the camp. “Call this batch Unity Juice! Who's thirsty?!”

Miller nudged my arm with his elbow and gestured Jasper. “You want some?” He asked.

I shook my head. “No. I think I'll keep a clear head tonight,” I said. Miller shrugged and joined the crowd of people around Jasper, grabbing a flask from one of the tables outside the tents.

I focused my attention back on the radio for the end of Jaha's speech. “ _To our sons and daughters on earth, listen to this message: we will see you soon_ ,” Jaha said. He looked directly into the camera that was recording him and feeding his image to our screen on the ground. “ _The first Exodus ship will launch in under sixty hours, carrying you the reinforcements that you need, so stay strong. Help is on the way_.”

“Hey,” Bellamy came up beside me with a metal cup in each hand. He smiled softly and held one of the cups out to me. “Happy Unity Day,” he said.

I glanced at the cup and shook my head. “I'm not drinking,” I told him.

“Neither am I,” he replied, forcing the cup into my hand. “It's just water,” he added. We raised our cups and tapped them together with a quiet _clink_.

“Happy Unity Day,” I said. “Let's hope we make it to the next one.”

Bellamy chuckled and we looked back at the screen just as Jaha's speech ended, at long last, and the pageant began. A young girl with her hair in two pigtails stood at the centre of a circle of the flags of the twelve nations that once owned the stations of the Ark. The flags were held by a young representative from each station. “ _Long ago, when the earth was on fire, twelve stations floated through space all alone,_ ” the girl repeated what had been rehearsing for weeks She was from Alpha Station—the speaker always was. “ _Then one day, Mir floated by Shenzhen, and they realised that life would be better together. The other stations saw this, and they wanted to be together too. When all the stations were formed, they called themselves—_ ” The feed cut out suddenly and the screen went black.

“Aw, _shit_ ,” I cursed, giving my cup back to Bellamy and moving towards the radio tent.

Bellamy grabbed my wrist, stopping me. “Renee, leave it,” he said. “You can fix it later.”

“Bellamy—”

“It's a _holiday_ , Renee,” he urged. “You've worked enough holidays. Take this one off, will you?”

I looked between him and the radio tent. He was right, but at the same time, I knew I wouldn't be able to have a good time knowing that we were no longer connected to Ark. After everything we did to establish a connection, I wasn't just going to join the party when the radio wasn't working. Being disconnected from them again made my chest tight, making it difficult to breathe evenly. I put my hand on top of Bellamy's and smiled apologetically. “I'm sorry, Bell, I gotta fix this,” I said. “I'll make it up to you, I promise,” I told him, backing away from him towards the radio tent. From the corner of my eye, I saw him sigh before turning and walking towards the gate.

Despite the radio cutting out and my being stuck trying to re-establish the signal between us and the Ark while everyone else in the camp got to let loose and party, things were finally coming together. Everyone on the Ark knew that the ground was survivable and that the Hundred were alive. They were preparing to send everyone down to join us. I was going to see my mother again soon. Bellamy and I were good. The only thing that hadn't fallen into place with everything else was Roman. So why did I still have that heavy feeling in my gut? Like everything wasn't okay? Like something bad was going to happen? It made me feel sick. So many things had already gone wrong. So much bad had already come and gone. I wasn't sure I could take much more of it.

“Bellamy said the radio cut out,” Raven said as she joined me in the tent. I was crouched behind the monitor, fiddling with the wires and checking that none of them had come loose.

“Yeah. But I don't think the problem is on our end,” I told her. I stood up and ripped out the wires that connected the monitor to the radio, moving to sit at the table. “I'll try the frequency the guards use,” I muttered, adjusting the dial at the centre of the radio. I lifted the mouthpiece to my face and spoke into it, repeating exactly what I had done the night of the storm. After ten minutes of trying every frequency that I knew that Ark, I still hadn't gotten a response. It was just static on the other end.

“Renee, you look shattered,” Raven said to me, putting a hand on my shoulder. “You should take a break.”

“I can't,” I said. “I've got fix this.”

“You can't fix it, Renee, because it's not broken. Like you said, the issue isn't on our end,” she retorted. “Look, they know we're down here. They're coming down in a couple of days anyway. We've done all that we can for them. Now, we should be making the most of the time we have before the Guard comes down and takes over.”

I knew she was right, but I still had that horrible sinking feeling in my gut. Something was wrong. Instead of telling her that, I nodded my head and stood up. “You're right,” I said. “Of course you're right. When are you ever wrong,” I murmured.

Raven chuckled. “Go have some fun,” she ordered, pushing me gently towards the tent flaps.

 

 

As the night progressed, the people around me got more and more drunk and I found myself growing giddy on their intoxication. By the time darkness fell, I had given in and picked up a drink. And then another. And another. Each drink seemed like a better idea than the last one as I refilled my cup each time. Everything became funny. I laughed hysterically every time someone fell over. I howled at jokes that weren't in the last bit funny and often made no sense. I talked to people that I had never talked to before like we were best friends who had known each other our whole lives.

I had been sitting at the fire with a group of people for a while when I stood up to go and refill my cup again. But on my way to the cauldron, something else caught my eye and distracted me. I put my cup down and made my way over to where Bellamy stood. I was still able to walk in a straight line, so when he spotted me he didn't immediately realise that I had been drinking. His lips spread into a smile and put his gun down against the wall.

“Hey,” he greeted.

I grinned. “Hey,” I replied. I put my hands on his shoulders when I reached him and slammed my lips against his. He was taken aback and quickly pushed me back when he tasted the lingering flavour of moonshine in my mouth.

He looked down at me, partly amused and partly annoyed. “You're drunk,” he stated.

“I'm not drunk, Bell. I had, like, three drinks, okay? I'm sober enough to know what I'm doing,” I said. I grabbed the collar of his jacket and pulled his lips back down to mine. He didn't resist this time, winding his arms around my waist. I had one hand on his face and the other on the back of his neck, my fingers curling into his hair. He broke the kiss and pulled me behind a tree that hid us from anyone walking past. My back hit the tree trunk and he pressed himself close to me, capturing my mouth with his again.

The rough bark dug into my back as he pressed harder against me. He ran his hands down my sides until they were on the backs of my thighs and he lifted me up. I instinctively wrapped my legs around his waist, pulling us even tighter together. I could feel something pressing against my butt and it made me grin against his lips. A low groan rumbled from his chest and he kissed along my jaw to my neck. I threw my head back against the tree as he gently bit my skin. His fingers dug into my thighs. He wasn't gentle like Roman was. He wasn't hurting me, but he was just the right kind of rough that made the whole thing so much more enjoyable.

“Shit, Bell,” I groaned as he snagged my ear between his teeth and tugged slightly. I reached between us, fiddling with the button at the top of his pants in an attempt to undo it.

Bellamy removed one of his hands from thighs and grabbed my hands, looking into my eyes. “Are you sure about this?” he asked. I nodded my head. I had never been more sure about anything. He let go of my hands and I managed to unfasten the button. I kissed him as I reached inside his pants. His muscles tensed, his fingers digging harder into my thighs, and he groaned into my mouth. “Jesus, Ren,” he breathed and kissed me harder.

“I love you, Bell,” I whispered and I felt him smile.

He bit my bottom lip, tugging it and causing me to grin from ear to ear. “I love you too, Renee,” he said.

“Bellamy?” Clarke's familiar voice called from nearby. My eyes widened and untangled my legs from Bellamy's waist, hopping back down onto the ground as he tied his pants. He grabbed my hips and placed me in front of him as Clarke came into view. She looked at the two of us and her eyebrows furrowed. My face was hot and no doubt visibly redder than usual and the way we were standing made it pretty obvious that we were hiding something. “I need to talk to you,” she said, the suspicion clear in her blue eyes.

“H-hey, Princess,” Bellamy stammered. “Having fun yet?” he asked.

“I'm _serious_ ,” Clarke pressed.

I lifted one side of my mouth, trying to shake the awkwardness of the situation. “You always are, Griffin,” I said. “So talk.” _For the love of god, talk so that I can think about some other than the thing poking my lower back._

Clarke looked between us, chewing on the inside of her lip. She was either oblivious to the sexual tension or she was ignoring it. “Finn set up a meeting with the Grounders. I'm leaving to go talk to them,” she told us.

I looked up and met Bellamy's gaze for a moment. I knew we were both thinking the same thing. Instantly, things were less awkward and I was no longer thinking about what had just been happening between the two of us a couple of minutes ago. “Because you think that impaling people on spears is code for 'let's be friends'?” He asked.

“Have you lost your damn mind?” I said. “This is crazy. We can't... _reason_ with these people. They're animals.”

“I think it might be worth a shot,” Clarke said quietly, not wanting to be overheard. “I mean, we _do_ have to live with them.”

“They'll probably gut you; string you up as a warning.” Bellamy pointed out.

“Well, that's why I'm here,” she shrugged. “I need you to follow us, be our backup.”

“Finn doesn't know about this, does he?” I mused.

“Finn doesn't need to know,” Clarke replied. She looked at both of us in turn. “And... bring guns,” she added.

“You got it, Princess,” I nodded.

Clarke nodded once, confirming the plan, and turned on her heel. As soon as she was gone, Bellamy breathed a sigh of relief. His leaned forward, putting his forehead on top of my head and chuckled. “That was close,” he said.

“Too close,” I agreed. I turned around to face him. “We'd better get ready to leave and you should... take care of that,” I said, nodding down towards his crotch.

“You're staying here.” Bellamy said firmly as he adjusted his pants so that it was less obvious.

“Like hell I am!” I exclaimed. “I'm not leaving you to go out there on your own.”

“I won't be on my own,” he said. “I'll take Miller.”

“Passed out in his tent. I saw Drew carrying him across the camp.”

“Then I'll take Jasper. But you are staying here, Renee,” he said. “I'm not taking you out there to get hurt, or worse, _killed_.”

“Oh, but you expect me to let you go out there and get hurt or killed?” I retorted. I folded my arms stubbornly across my chest. “Let's get one thing straight, Blake. I don't need you to protect me. I can do that myself. I'm sick of people trying to look after me. I don't _need_ that. I just need you be with me,” I said. “We watch each other's backs, Bell, that's the way it's always been. I don't want that to change just because _we_ have.”

Bellamy shook his head. “I hate how stubborn you are,” he said, but his voice was soft and I knew he had caved. “I just don't want anything to happen to you, Renee.”

“Nothing will happen to me. I promise,” I smiled.

 


End file.
